LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

%P Ocpjrigf/I I?o. 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



V 



The Pacific Coast 
t 
Pulpit 



Edited by the Rev. D. Hanson Irwin, 

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY THE 

Rev. Robert Mackenzie, D. D. 



"ait of °<" 



FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY X^c/ 
New York : : Chicago : : Toronto 

Publishers of Evangelical Literature. 



"WASV 



1 



[the library I 

iOF CONGEE** 1 
|WASHINGTOW_ 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1893, by 



FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY, 



In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. C. 



EDITOR'S PREFACE. 



If any apology be demanded for flooding the 
theological market with another volume of ser- 
mons, let it be found in the introduction to this 
volume, kindly furnished by my friend, the Rev. 
Dr. Mackenzie, or in the volume itself, which, I 
beg leave to think, is no unworthy addition to the 
sermon literature of the day. 

I would acknowledge the uniform kindness of 
my brethren on the Coast, and so express to them 
my thanks that I have been permitted to complete 
this selection of their pulpit work with the single 
aim and hope that as their ministry from the pulpit 
has been used of God to the conversion of souls 
and the confirming of their faith, so now in a still 
larger sense, the Divine Spirit may carry these 
arrows of gospel truth home to the mind and heart 
of ' ' the larger congregation. " 

It has been my privilege to listen to the delivery 
of some of these sermons, and I cordially assent 
that in some cases the charm of personal magnet- 
ism has much to do with the warmth of the recep- 
tion of the Divine truth. I am not without hope 
that the reading may be as profitable to others as 
the hearing was to me. 
[ill] 



iv EDITOR'S PREFACE. 

It is necessary I should insert an explanatory re- 
mark concerning the address of Rev. Ng Poon 
Chew. That good brother preaches in the Chinese 
mission in San Francisco in CJiinese ; and such 
preaching, when translated, would lose its value for 
the general hearer or reader. For this reason, and 
at his special request, I have published an address 
which he delivered before a large congregation dur- 
ing the famous religious revival of 1892. 

I must gratefully acknowledge the manner in 
which the work of publishing has been executed ; 
and the assistance rendered me in the same by Mr. 
Fleming H. Revell. 

I commend these sermons to the careful perusal 
of all who are ready to receive the truth in the 
love of it, and I pray the Divine blessing may at- 
tend the word thus faithfully expounded. 

D. Hanson Irwin. 

San Francisco, Cat., October, 1893. 



INTRODUCTION. 



There are two things the same everywhere, in 
London and New York, in Boston and San Fran- 
cisco, — the human heart and the Word of God. 
And when these two are properly brought together, 
the same result everywhere follows. We do not 
meet a different race of men on the Pacific Coast, 
nor do we need a special Bible for California. 
Both these are stereotyped. We have no call to 
tamper with the plates. 

The circumstances and accidents of society, how- 
ever, vary in varying times and places. There is 
a time current and place current characteristic of 
this Coast, which must be taken into practical ac- 
count by the preacher. Custom does not keep the 
ministry here. There is no premium on the pro- 
fession of Christianity. A man's position in busi- 
ness, or politics, a woman's position in society, is 
not materially affected by attendance or non-at- 
tendance at church. 

The sun shines, and the rain falls ; the spring in 
matchless beauty, and the autumn in marvelous 
plenty, come down on both alike, and God does not 
settle his accounts on the first of each October out 
here. Life seems prosperous without religion, and 

M 



vi INTR OD UCTJON. 



there is a tacit conviction cherished by many that 
religion is not so important but that one can get 
along very well without it in California. 

It is not infidelity, there is not much of that 
here ; infidelity requires a more earnest soil than 
we yet have. It is not agnosticism ; God is ac- 
knowledged and believed in and believed to govern, 
good-naturedly withal. It is not any form of active 
antagonism to Christ and Christianity, but a con- 
tented indifferentism, a modern Athenianism, — 
' i We will hear thee again on this matter," while 
they go back to the market-place. 

This condition can be successfully met only by 
an evangelical, orthodox gospel. It is sometimes 
thought that the demands of the gospel must be 
modified and its warnings softened in such a coun- 
try as this. No greater mistake can be made. 
The theology which would prevail must be an out- 
and-out theology. The usual compromises which 
have dulled the conscience of those in older com- 
munities opposed to an evangelical gospel are not 
equally successful here. Here, unless a man has 
real religion, he sees no necessity for professing or 
supporting the outward appearance of one. The 
West is conservative in theology, not because its 
ministers are ignorant of the scholastic issues of the 
day, but because they daily meet not a speculative, 
but a practical philosophy of life, and have to meet 
it, not with the "perhaps" of a possible interpreta- 



INTRODUCTION. vii 



tion, but with the ' ' Thus saith the Lord " of a posi- 
tive conviction. Any indefiniteness or uncertainty 
is discovered and resented first by the people, who 
leave the guesser with the remark that they have 
guesses enough of their own. 

Nor does sensationalism, commonly understood, 
avail in the community. There is already so much 
genuine, untrammeled sensationalism in business, 
in society, and in the newspaper, that people com- 
ing to church pray to be delivered from it, knowing 
well its hollowness. The big drum has never been 
successfully beat for any length of time out here. 
The drum and the drummer have appeared occa- 
sionally in each of the denominations, but after a 
brief performance they have been excused. 

The truth as it is in Christ, preached in knowl- 
edge, in sympathy, and in love, will accomplish 
here what it has accomplished elsewhere, — the 
conversion and sanctification of men, and nothing 
else will. Robt. Mackenzie. 

San Francisco, Cat., October, i£pj. 



CONTENTS. 

The Incarnate Word i 

Rev. John Q. Adams. 

Some New Thing 18 

Rev. Arthur J. Brown. 

Too Busy 35 

Rev. E. S. Chapman, D. D. 

The Chinese in San Francisco 49 

Rev. Ng Poon Chew. 

What Christ Teaches us to Believe about the 

Bible 57 

Rev. R. F. Coyle, D. D. 

The Sure Foundation, and its Seal 73 

Rev. Arthur Crosby, A. M. 

What to do with Christ 86 

Rev. J. W. Dinsmore. 

Where to Throw your Salt, or "Healing the 

Springs " 101 

Rev. Thomas C. Easton, D. D. 



CONTENTS. 



God Inscrutable : Why ? 1 18 

Rev. W. W. Faris, D. D. 

Christ's Challenge and Question to Unbe- 
lievers 131 

Rev. H. A. Ketchum, D D. 

A Life Retrospect 142 

Rev. Henry Collin Minton, D. D. 

Vicarious Suffering 153 

Rev. Robert Mackenzie, D. D. 

Ourselves Sinners 171 

Prof. Warren H. Landon, D. D. 

What Think Ye of Christ ? 185 

Rev. W. B. Noble, D. D. 

The Anchors of the Soul 200 

Rev. J. M. Patterson. 

Love's Bitter Cup 220 

Rev. James Cuming Smith. 

The Foolishness of Preaching 229 

Rev. John B. Stewart, D. D. 




BEV, JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. 



THE INCARNATE WORD. 



BY REV. JOHN Q. ADAMS, 
Pastor Westminster Presbyterian Church, San Francisco, California. 



And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us (and 
we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the 
Father) , full of grace and truth. John i : 14. 

The Word was made flesh. He became what 
He was not before, a man, a whole man, a man in 
his physical, intellectual, and moral nature. The 
text asserts ' ' the reality and the integrity of the 
human mode of existence into which the Word en- 
tered. " — Godet. 

The Word became flesh and dwelt, tabernacled, 
among us, full of grace and truth. The glory of 
this Word, the glory as of the only begotten of 
the Father, John saw. He heard, he saw, he in- 
tently regarded, and he handled this Word, who 
became flesh. 

But who is this Word ? The Word was ' ' in the 
beginning with God, " and ' ' was God " in that 
beginning ; all things were made by Him ; He is 
the Life and Light of men ; His own received Him 
not, but He gives power, right, privilege, to those 

[i] 



PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 



who receive Him, to become the children of God ; 
He becomes man, and other men gaze upon Him ; 
a forerunner bears witness to Him, and declares 
that ' ' of His fullness have all we received, and 
grace for grace," and that this grace came by Jesus 
Christ. The Word, then, is Jesus Christ, the only 
begotten Son of God, who, though manifested in 
the flesh, was God, and is in the bosom of the 
Father. No plainer statements are needed. 

This prologue to John's Gospel has been memo- 
rable in the history of Christian thought. Rarely, 
if ever, have such profound truths been expressed 
in so few words, or have words had concentrated 
upon them so much study. They teach us that the 
Word, Jesus Christ, existed prior to his earthly birth, 
and before all created things, and that He was pos- 
sessed of a superhuman character. The Creator of 
all created things, He is excluded from their num- 
ber, and His eternal Deity affirmed ; for when time 
began, He was. He is the Life, the Light, the 
only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, the Word become 
flesh and dwelling among men. 

We have, then, as our fundamental thought, the 
very foundation of our faith, the basis of the Gos- 
pel, the INCARNATION OF GOD IN MAN. 
What is thus affirmed is not an isolated truth, nor 
one that appears only in John's Gospel. You can- 
not tear it out of this Bible ; it cannot be separated 
from this Gospel, without its becoming another 



THE INCARNATE WORD. 3 

Bible, another Gospel. The fate of Christianity 
rests upon this fact. We affirm, also, that it is the 
supreme fact of history. It is almost a trite state- 
ment to make, that as once all roads led to Rome, 
so all ancient history leads to Bethlehem's manger ; 
and that from Jesus of Nazareth, modern history 
and civilization date their beginning and have re- 
ceived their organizing law. If, then, this Incar- 
nation be impossible, if its proofs be insufficient, if 
we are compelled to reject it, then with it goes this 
Book and that Man who has deceived ail the ages ; 
and history becomes a tangled skein. Strange, in- 
deed, will it be if He who is ■ ■ the purest of the 
mighty, the mightiest of the pure ; who with His 
pierced hands raised empires from their foundations, 
turned the stream of history from its old channels, 
and still continues to rule and guide the ages," shall 
at last be found to be other than He claimed, or 
only the creation of an idle brain and a dying 
world ! 

This question, then, of the Incarnation becomes 
of practical interest to us, even though sometimes 
it may seem a hard and dry subject, encrusted with 
the thought, wise or unwise, of the past. If it be 
not true, our faith is vain. And let it be remem- 
bered just here that it concerns primarily a revealed 
fact, not a dogma, not an abstract truth. Its his- 
torical verity and our belief of it are the first things 
involved, and not our speculative knowledge of its 



PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 



processes. The latter will always be somewhat 
vague and indefinite, the former may be clear and 
positive. 

I. 

In further studying this question, consider in the 
first place, that the history of religious thought 
shows nothing more clearly than this ; that men 
everywhere, in all conditions of society, and un- 
der all forms of religious belief, have felt the 
necessity of a mediator to stand between them and 
the Most High God. They have called Him by 
different names, but they have felt that He must be 
in some sense Deity incarnate, the divine and hu- 
man in one person. 

We do not dispute with those who assert that 
other religions have had their incarnations. It is 
what ought to have been expected, if Jesus Christ 
is the answer of heaven to the cry of earth. This 
admitted fact is an argument for the Christian 
truth. A solid foundation is thus furnished for the 
belief that the idea so universal has been realized 
in a fact \ the actual union of God and man in one 
person. The heathen religions have the idea ; the 
Christian religion alone has the reality. Every one 
who has a conscience has the ideal of a perfect 
man. He wants a model, and he creates one, but 
he wants more than this, — even the reality. That 
is given him in Jesus Christ, and nowhere else. 



THE INCARNATE WORD. 



It is to be remembered in this connection that 
within the historical period these heathen incar- 
nations, so-called, have tended to greater defi- 
niteness. The less clear and certain have been 
succeeded by the more positive and definite. Then, 
if we go back to the earliest records, into the pre- 
historic period, we seem to find clearer ideas on 
this matter than in history's morning. In other 
words, men worked from light into darkness, and 
then from the darkness toward the light again, in 
their thinking on this matter. But at the best these 
are only ' ' disfigured incarnations. " Still they rep- 
resent a trend of thought, a cry of the soul, that, 
if human nature be not a lie, must find its answer 
somewhere. The conclusion is certainly warranted 
from all this that there must be some grand neces- 
sity in human nature demanding such a mani- 
festation, or it would not have been universally 
craved. 

It is difficult to understand how any one after 
comparing these alleged incarnations with the Bib- 
lical, Christian conception, can honestly assert that 
the latter has grown out of the former. This, as 
is well known, is often the dogmatic assertion of 
certain would-be theologians in these days. But 
such a theory utterly fails to account for what is 
distinctive in the Christian idea, for that which 
separates it by an immeasurable distance from any 
other supposed incarnation. Thus the Christian 



PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 



idea itself may be brought forward as a further 
element in the proof of the fact. Whence this 
idea, so holy, so entirely separated from everything 
that is coarse, low, degrading, unworthy of God or 
man, which mars the world's thinking elsewhere on 
this subject, if the incarnation of Jesus Christ as a 
fact is not the foundation of the idea, if the fact 
does not answer to the idea as the original to its 
shadow ? Moreover Christianity teaches an incar- 
nation in order to a redemption, and thus is abso- 
lutely separated from other religious systems and 
from philosophical teachings on this matter. 

It follows from this universal want and this 
Christian answer to it, that the man who attempts 
to change the thinking that has ruled the world for 
many centuries, must have something like in kind 
to offer, or there is little hope of his success. Kant 
says somewhere : " Facts without ideas are blind, 
and ideas without facts are empty." The world 
has written in the past, and is writing to-day, its 
condemnation — because it has found them empty 
— upon many a scheme without facts offered it in 
place of that Manger and that Cross. And the 
attempt to resolve the incarnation of Jesus Christ 
into the idea of God in humanity, God in nature, 
God in everything, is putting emptiness in place of 
the Divine fullness. A personal God-man, mani- 
fested in historic time, alone answers the universal 
cry. The heart of man demands it. The only 



THE INCARNATE WORD. 



way to be rid of it is to educate him out of it, and 
in this process you have crushed out some of his 
noblest and holiest aspirations, dwarfed and crip- 
pled his soul. 

Still further confirmation of the necessity for a 
mediator is given by those who reject, sometimes 
with contempt, the Christian idea and fact. "Hu- 
man struggle, " says Weiss, ' ' has ever been a 
struggle toward an incarnation ; " and in saying this 
he considers he has set aside any necessity for the 
Incarnation. But that struggle is hopeless, and 
has no promise of success, if it was not ended 
when the angel chorus announced the birth of 
Christ our Lord. ' ' The Infinite Mother, " says 
Theodore Parker, ' ' spreads wide her arms to fold 
us to that universal breast, and is ready to inspire 
your soul. " — Sermons of Religion, p. 392. Here 
we have a God-woman ! Figurative language has 
gone mad, but the heart has simply cried out for 
what the head had denied it. 

Will not God help in this struggle ? Will He not 
answer this cry ? Will He not meet this universal 
want ? Is it not a fitting place for God to inter- 
vene ? If not, then our holiest aspirations only mock 
us, the heart of man has cruelly deceived him, and 
in place of a fact there is only emptiness. ' ' I 
need a God," a pagan of old is reported as saying, 
"who can speak to me and lead me." Has He 
come ? or look we for another ? 



PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 



II. 

We are thus led, in the second place, to consider 
whether Jesus Christ meets this demand. Do the 
facts concerning Him satisfy the necessities of the 
case ? 

The opinions with reference to Jesus Christ may 
be classed for our purpose now under three general 
divisions : First, that He was a mere man, not 
altogether faultless, who fell upon fortunate times, 
and into line with providential developments. But 
if only a man, why not other men like him in the 
ages since, who are farther along in the line of de- 
velopment, and are placed in more favorable circum- 
stances than He ? As well account for the ' ' Great 
Eastern " by saying that a school-boy whittled it 
with his jack-knife, or affirm that the Canyon of the 
Colorado was furrowed with a plow. The theory 
must account for the facts, and no mere man could 
ever have plowed the ages as He has done. 
Secondly, that He was a being more than human, 
but less than God. Then He is still at an infinite 
distance from God, but at a measurable distance 
from the worm. This theory does not meet the great 
want, and leaves a vacuum in history. Thirdly, 
that he was both the man of Nazareth and the 
only begotten and eternal Son of God. This is 
indeed a startling statement ! But such as this 
He claims to be ; and they who have opened their 



THE IXCARNATE WORD. 



hearts to receive Him ratify the claim. Account 
for it as you may, there is something about that 
Babe in Bethlehem's manger, that has caused more 
hearts to rejoice in His advent, than in all other 
birthdays, hoary with the centuries or fresh in re- 
membrance. But the only reason for it that ac- 
counts for the facts is that men have believed 
and still believe that there God and man met in 
one, in Jesus Christ, the Saviour of men. 

There is a mystery here, great and deep. We 
have climbed a lofty mountain peak in the moral 
and religious world when we stand on the mount 
of the Incarnation ; but as is the case even from 
Shasta's lofty dome, a horizon of darkness and 
ignorance bounds our vision. We need not deny 
nor attempt to cover up this fact. If it were not 
so, the God of grace would be a different Being 
from the God of nature. But it is a mystery 
which rests on facts that cannot be set aside. We 
are dealing with ' ' a problem, a mystery, a sym- 
metrical and exquisite conception, which certainly 
exists," though man may vehemently declare that 
he knows not how it can be, nor whence it is. 

' ' Treat this claim, " says some one, "asa similar 
claim of other men has been treated." The trouble 
is, the facts will not let us. We are not dealing 
with a man like other men, nor with a claim like 
other claims. They are separate and distinct. We 
have here the unique Man of all the ages, and a 



1 PA C1FIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

unique claim in its absolute holiness and redemp- 
tive purpose. 

The question, then, is not whether there is here 
a mystery, but whether the mystery is in harmony 
with all the rest and consistent with itself ; for all 
the facts demand a supernatural and mysterious 
person. Are there marks in all this history of a 
twofold nature ? Does this life begin and end in a 
mystery ? Is the preparation for it, and the out- 
come of it, consistent with the mystery of the per- 
son ? No long search is required to answer these 
questions. 

In the preparation for His coming He stands 
alone. No such anticipations of the corning of any 
other have ever been seen. Not only when the 
time came was one found to fill the place, as in the 
course of history elsewhere, but for long centuries 
a nation had been trained to wait for His law. 
They were anxiously peering into the future, ex- 
pecting . some one greater than Moses ; David's 
' ' Lord, " Isaiah's ' ' King " and ' ' Man of Sorrows, " 
Daniel's "Son of Man," and Malachi's "Messen- 
ger of the Covenant." Here is the fact, and the 
theory must recognize it. Ancient history con- 
verged to that Manger and that Cross. Away off 
upon the horizon some few true souls saw the 
faintest promise of the coming day, and were glad. 
The centuries rolled by, and brighter grew the sky, 
till when the Sun of Righteousness arose upon the 



THE INCARNATE WORD. 11 

world, all eyes were fastened on Him as the hope 
of all, and the angels joined with men in heralding 
His advent. Throughout this preparation we catch 
glimpses, we find intimations, of the Incarnation. 
There are mysterious appearances only understood 
in the light of the New Testament. Fitting pre- 
ludes they are to the mysteries that center in the 
Cradle and the Cross. Mysteries still, though we 
have beheld His glory. To Abraham, to Jacob, to 
Moses, and to other olden worthies, they were 
granted. And even in the dim twilight in which 
they saw Him, they knew Him as the " Angel of 
the Lord." To them He was a "King," "the 
Mighty God," "Father of Eternity," "the Prince 
of Peace," "the sure Foundation," and "the Right- 
eous Branch." But He was also a "Child," a 
1 ' Man of Sorrows, " a " Root out of dry ground, " 
the "Seed of the woman," a "Son of David," and 
"the Despised and Rejected of men." 

What means this preparation for His coming ? 
this dual character of the promised One ? the pre- 
figurations of God manifest in the flesh ? Is not 
the mystery which follows fittingly preceded by 
the mystery of the preparation ? Must not the 
right answer to the question, Who is He ? be based 
on these facts, even though they be mysterious ? 

When the long course of preparation was ended, 
and the fullness of the time had come, the 
dual mystery still continues. The introduction 



12 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

to His humanity takes place in a stable ; that 
to His divinity amid scenes that are strange 
and supernatural, not like the ordinary and the 
human. We have the Annunciation and the tri- 
umphing faith of the mother of our Lord ; the 
angel chorus and the star ; the song of Simeon, 
and Anna's response ; the temple scene when 
twelve years of age ; the speaking with authority 
and the mighty works ; the Garden and the Cross ; 
the resurrection and the ascension ; and his reg- 
nant power among men ever since ; — all this of 
Him who was hungry and thirsty, who was weary 
and troubled, who wept and died. What is the 
meaning of it all ? We have as much reason for 
doubting our own identity, as these facts. Does 
not the mystery continue ? and is it not consistent ? 
Does it not strengthen the argument, and furnish 
additional proof of the Incarnation ? 

Then consider for a moment Christ's wholly 
unique position in history. It has been won 
against every adverse circumstance, — birth, na- 
tion, education, social position, poverty, failure to 
commit a word to writing, and shameful death at 
the hands of His own countrymen. While at the 
same time, the men who loved Him with a love 
stronger than they loved life, and who wrote His 
life, were so reticent that they have scarcely left us 
a hint that enables us to reproduce His personal 
appearance. Almost everything of detail consid- 



• THE INCARNATE WORD. 13 

ered essential to biography is omitted. Jesus him- 
self only wrote upon the sand. Rightly, it would 
seem, might His contemporaries have said that this 
represented His influence, which the first breath 
of heaven, or wave of earth would destroy. Yet 
' ' His influence is the marvel of history. " How 
can these things be ? Why is it that the only 
nations that are free to-day, are those which to 
some extent have been baptized with His influence ? 
Why is it that civilization has marched with Jesus 
Christ through the centuries and among the na- 
tions ? No reasonable explanation has yet been 
given, save that the Word became flesh and dwelt 
among us. Rest assured that this idea of the In- 
carnate Word ' ' would scarcely have survived the 
first shock of solid opposition " it certainly has met, 
much less have marched "in the van of nineteen 
centuries with unwearied feet, " as it certainly has 
done, if the idea did not rest on the solid ground 
of fact. 

There is no question but that He was a man. 
For, — 

" Like as a man, he trod on earthly soil, 

He bore each pang, and strove in weary toil ; 

He spake with human words, with pity sighed ; 

Like us he mourned, and feared, and wept, and died." 

None the less surely do the facts here considered 
tell us that He is something more than man — that 
we worship in Jesus of Nazareth, God manifest in 
the flesh. 



14 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Review briefly the ground gone over. We have 
found that John plainly declares that the Word was 
God incarnate, and that this is in harmony with 
the other teachings of this book. We have recog- 
nized the fact that there has been a universal want 
felt for such an Incarnation ; and we have rightly 
reasoned, we believe, that this want warrants us 
in believing that God will satisfy it, else our nature 
is a lie, and God a deceiver. We have found it im- 
possible to believe that the Scriptural idea was de- 
veloped out of the other. We have admitted a 
mystery that is unexplained, but have found this 
mystery consistent with the facts. A mystery pre- 
ceded Him, traveled with him in His life on earth, 
and has followed Him through the ages. All these 
facts receive their only satisfactory explanation in 
the statement that He was and is God. Renan 
has truly said : "A great life is an organic whole 
which cannot be constructed by the simple ag- 
glomeration of minute facts." We accept his state- 
ment, and affirm that here in the Gospels ' ' a great 
life" is presented, which is "an organic whole," 
and which could not have been constructed if it 
was not a real life. And because it is a reality, 
God in human form has spoken to men. 

The lessons that almost force themselves upon 
us are many, and must here be briefly stated : — 

i. By becoming man, He has made known God. 
"No man hath seen God at any time; the only 



THE INCARNATE WORD. 15 

begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, 
he hath declared him." For the chief part of its 
knowledge of God the world is indebted, not to 
nature, not to science, not to reason, but to Jesus 
Christ. 

2. He who became man so continues to be, — 
"the man Christ Jesus." Let us not lose hold of 
this great truth with all that it involves. The 
world needed the God-man in the first century, and 
it needs Him in the nineteenth as well. And, 
blessed be God, at the right hand of God the 
Father Almighty, He still continues to be man. 
We have here the truth made plain, that the body 
is an integral part of our humanity ; and the assur- 
ance given that He will ' ' fashion anew the body of 
our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the 
body of his glory. " "To the Christian alone it is 
given to see the Man Christ Jesus, radiant in resur- 
rection life, filling with His brightness the eternal 
future ; and with Him, His redeemed perfected in 
their humanity, body, soul, and spirit." — Andrew's 
Revelation of God to Man, p. 377. 

3. By becoming man, He has become our brother. 
1 ' And the warmth of His heart is more to us than 
the gems that sparkle in his crown. " 

4. By becoming man, He has become our Re- 
deemer. The Incarnation gives us a " sense of 
prodigious depths in human ruin," but it also en- 
ables us to look upon "altitudes in human blessed- 



16 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

ness." Made " in the likeness of sinful flesh," by 
his death He has " condemned sin in the flesh," 
and brought to us deliverance from its guilt and 
power. The greatness of the gift is in harmony 
with the greatness of the need. Sin has done its 
awful work, slavery and death are its fruits. But 
here is One who has conquered death, who has 
power to break the chains of sin and to let the op- 
pressed go free. With peace and joy was his birth 
proclaimed ; and after centuries of trial He still of- 
fers peace and joy to every heart that admits Him. 
Open thy heart now, and let Christ be born in thee, 
1 ' the hope of glory. " 

5. By becoming man, He has become our merci- 
ful and faithful High Priest. And having suffered 
Himself, being tempted, "He is able to succor 
them that are tempted." 

6. The Incarnation gives us, also, the assurance 
that the work of the Redeemer shall be completed. 
We do not follow a defeated Leader, nor a forlorn 
hope. Light is here thrown upon the divine pur- 
poses, and even death itself is transformed into the 
vestibule of completed redemption. 

7. This same Jesus, taken from us into heaven, 
shall so come again in like manner. For He 
" shall appear a second time, apart from sin, to 
them that wait for him, unto salvation." Heb, 
9:28. "Amen: Come, Lord Jesus." 



THE INCARNATE WORD. 17 

Till then, let us give Him our heart's best offer- 
ing ; let us consecrate to Him our all ; let us obey 
His voice ; and let us never weary of proclaiming 
Him as the only Saviour, the Life and Light of men, 
the Word become flesh. 

"Joy to the world, the Lord is come. 
Let earth receive her King ; 
Let every heart prepare him room, 
And heaven and nature sing." 



SOME NEW THING. 



BY REV. ARTHUR J. BROWN, D. D. , 
Pastor of First Presbyterian Church, Portland, Oregon. 



For all the Athenians and strangers which were there 
spent their ti?ne in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear 
some new thing. Acts 17: 21. 

Athens ! the very name conjures up a host of 
pleasing memories, — memories of battle-field and 
studio, of bema and academy. It was a wonder- 
ful city, a city of spacious forums and graceful por- 
ticoes ; of shapely statues and magnificent palaces ; 
of temple-crowned hills looking up to a radiant sky, 
and away to a blue and sparkling sea. To that 
city we trace much of our intellectual inspiration. 
It has been happily characterized as one of those 
cities whose contributions to the world have been 
greater than those of empires. All Russia means 
less to us than that single town, whose population 
was never great as compared with modern cities ; 
for there the human mind attained its highest 
culture. There appeared a long line of poets and 
philosophers, sculptors and architects, orators and 
statesmen, whose fame has survived the changes of 
[18] 




REV. ARTHUR BROWN, D. D. 



SOME NEW THING. 19 

more than twenty centuries, and which will survive 
the changes of twenty centuries to come. There 
beauty and valor, eloquence and song, patriotism 
and refinement, all physical graces and intellectual 
accomplishments, made their home. And to-day, 
we, though of a far-distant age and land, find a 
reverence for the achievements of Athens, com- 
patible with nineteenth century enlightenment, 
and deem a knowledge of her language and litera- 
ture indispensable to a liberal education. 

But the city which Paul saw was not the glori- 
ous Athens of old. There was, indeed, no visible 
change. Outwardly, Athens was as magnificent as 
ever. Her public and private edifices were still 
numerous and costly. Innumerable statues still 
adorned her streets and temples. But there was 
an intellectual and moral decay. The vigor of the 
citizens had departed ; the spirit of independence 
had vanished. Athens was no longer producing 
great men or doing memorable deeds ; she was 
simply ' ' trading " on the memory of the past glories. 
A Miltiades no longer led her citizens forth to war ; 
a Pericles no longer guided her councils ; a Socra- 
tes no longer disputed in her forums. Her streets 
were filled with shallow rhetoricians, who boasted 
of a greatness which they were not enhancing. It 
was a city of gossipers — of babblers — of men in- 
tellectually enfeebled and morally debased. Still 
" Greece, but living Greece no more." 



20 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

As Paul walked the streets of this city, ' ' his 
spirit was stirred in him." He saw the idolatry of 
the people, but he also saw another evidence of 
degeneracy which impressed him almost as deeply 
as the idolatry, and which was even more truly 
characteristic. It secured him a hearing, but it 
deprived the hearing of value. He describes it in 
the text : ' ' All the Athenians and strangers which 
were there spent their time in nothing else, but 
either to tell, or to hear some new thing." A 
manifest physical, intellectual, and moral weakness 
was strangely blended with an intense eagerness 
for novelty. We ordinarily associate a desire for 
new things with progress, but here that desire is 
associated with that which is the reverse of prog- 
ress. 

This warrants the statement that a desire for 
something new is not necessarily indicative of prog- 
ress. Indeed, it may be indicative of regress. It 
may not be an earnest desire for something better, 
but a mere restless, uneasy craving for change. To 
seek the new simply because it is the new, and 
apart from any consideration of its intrinsic worth, 
is to go backward rather than forward. 

I would not disparage legitimate desire for prog- 
ress. Only a bigot will assert that "that which 
is new is not true, and that which is true is not 
new." Some new things are true, and some old 
things are false. As a rule, too, the collective 



SOME NEW THING. 21 

wisdom of an age has been greater than that 
of the age which preceded it. I am persuaded 
that the world is growing better and wiser. I 
should be sorry if it were not. God reigns. 
* • There is yet more light to break out of His 
most holy Word," more truth to be discovered in 
the realms of nature and of mind. Our own age 
has made invaluable contributions to the stock of 
the world's knowledge, and succeeding ages will 
doubtless make other contributions equally valu- 
able. Let reverent investigation go on. Let it 
be accorded the widest liberty. To hinder it were 
intellectual and moral treason. 

But the contention now is, that progress and 
restlessness are not synonymous terms. It is not 
the seeking of ' ' some new thing " which is wrong, 
but the " doing nothing else, but either to tell, or 
to hear some new thing." Indeed, so far from 
being good, it is evil. It indicates a fevered con- 
dition of the system — an unhealthy and morbid 
state. It begets instability of character and pur- 
pose. It leads to superficial ideas and modes of 
thinking. It withdraws attention from the tried 
and settled, and directs it to the flotsam and jetsam 
of daily happenings, the real importance of which 
is hardly ever discerned till time has set them in 
their true perspective. I do not mean, of course, 
that a knowledge of daily happenings is of no 
value ; but it is not all that is of value. Much 



22 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

occurred before our time which is of inestimable 
importance. Men need to-day, not less of the 
new, but more of the old, a wiser perception of its 
relative worth. 

More seriously, this craving for something new 
often dupes men. As a matter of fact, most new 
things are comparatively worthless — not all, but 
most. Thousands of new books are being pub- 
lished every year, but whoever takes the time and 
patience to examine them, will find that the really 
valuable books are like Gratiano's two grains of 
wheat in two bushels of chaff. Originality is rare. 
What we commonly call originality is usually ec- 
centricity, and eccentricity nearly always means a 
screw loose in the intellectual or moral machinery. 
If an alleged new thing proves to be really good, 
the presumption is that it is not as new as it was 
supposed to be. 

But it not infrequently happens that the so- 
called new idea is an old error. We hear much in 
these days about materialism as the most formid- 
able of modern foes to Christianity. But ■ ' the 
materialists of our day have not advanced a step 
upon the system of Epicurus," who lived three 
hundred years before Christ. Many deny the doc- 
trine of the Trinity, who are apparently ignorant 
that such a man as Arius ever existed, and that 
every phase of the Trinitarian conflict was fought 
out in the fourth century by masters in apologetics. 



SOME NEW THING. 23 

We are told almost daily that modern thought has 
shown a belief in miracles to be unreasonable, and 
yet there is hardly a modern objection to miracles 
which was not anticipated by Celsus, who lived in 
the second century. Multitudes have adopted the 
theories of Strauss regarding the person of Christ, 
who evidently do not know that the theory of 
Strauss has been repudiated in the land of his 
birth, and that ' ' there is not enough left of the 
mythical theory of Strauss to make a fig-leaf to 
cover the shame of modern skepticism." The ma- 
jority of these people who so ostentatiously pa- 
rade themselves as " advanced thinkers," are really 
retrogressive thinkers. So far from being origi- 
nators of anything new and good, they are 
as a rule, simply body-snatchers, prowling in 
the world's theological grave-yard, resurrecting 
moldering skeletons, dressing them up showily, 
and complacently displaying them to the world as 
the "latest teachings of modern science." Ever 
and anon some troubled soul sends me a newspa- 
per clipping containing an attack upon evangelical 
Christianity, and implores me to write an article in 
reply. But I usually find the article to be a rehash 
of arguments which have not only been refuted a 
hundred times, but which are no longer used even by 
intelligent skeptics. It is strange that some news- 
papers, which are conspicuously able in their dis- 
cussion of secular topics, should sometimes allow 



24 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

their ' ' religious " editors to convert their columns 
into a veritable museum of malodorous antiquities. 
Instead of being tempted to write an article in 
reply, I am more often tempted to make the re- 
quest which Mark Twain is said to have made of 
the Egyptian guide who was waxing eloquent over a 
collection of mummies: "If you have any nice, 
fresh corpses, now, trot them out ; but do n't try to 
palm off any more of these moldy mummies on us." 

Conversely, the presumption is that the old and 
established ideas are true. Not always, I grant. 
I would not fall into the opposite error. I would 
not question the reality or the value of the many 
great achievements of the present age. But it is a 
fair presumption that the old is the true. This 
was so of Athens in the -time of Paul. The past 
was glorious, but the Athenians of Paul's day, with 
all their passion for hearing or telling some new 
thing, added nothing to the stock of the world's 
knowledge. For all that we owe to Athens, we go 
centuries back of those babblers. 

It is a recognized principle in our civil govern- 
ment that the opinion of the multitude is more apt 
to be correct than the opinion of the individual. 
Our thought is but the development of this princi- 
ple. The accumulated wisdom of ages is more 
likely to be of value than the wisdom of a single 
generation. Dryden and Milton were contempora- 
ries. The age in which they lived thought Dryden 



SOME NEW THING. 25 

the greater poet, but posterity has reversed that 
judgment. The world now places Milton in the 
front rank of poets, and Dryden in the third rank. 
So, too, the contemporaries of John Bunyan re- 
garded him and his work with contempt, and even 
Cowper in his exquisitely appreciative tribute 
said : — 

" I name thee not, lest so despised a name 
Should move a sneer at thy deserved fame." 

But to-day the "Pilgrim's Progress" is considered 
one of the world's best books, and the most fas- 
tidious critics vie with each other in their tributes of 
praise. When any idea, or book, or institution 
has withstood the storms of ages and approved 
itself to the judgment of successive generations, the 
probabilities are that it is based on eternal truth. 
This is well illustrated by the history of the Church. 
How enduring her power has been ! Centuries 
have come and gone, empires have risen and crum- 
bled, but the Church of God has remained. Revo- 
lutions which have brought ruin to everything else 
have only hastened her onward progress. 

" O, where are kings and empires now, 
Of old that went and came ? 
But, Lord, thy church is praying yet, 
A thousand years the same. 

"Unshaken as eternal hills, 
Immovable she stands, 
A mountain that shall fill the earth — 
A house not made by hands." 



26 * PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

All history teaches us that progress is as likely to 
consist in getting back to old standards as in creat- 
ing new ones. These things need to be remembered 
in this age, particularly in America. A craving 
for the new is fast becoming a national character- 
istic. We have a comparatively new country ; we 
are giving the world some new ideas and inventions 
of real value, and, intoxicated by our success, we 
are in danger of being led into the restless spirit of 
the Athenians of Paul's time, who "spent their 
time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear 
some new thing. " European observers like Bryce 
notice this spirit and comment upon it. There is 
real ground for the apprehension that we may be- 
come a volatile people, lacking in stability and 
weight of character. 

We see this in literature, in the demand for new 
books, and in the neglect of old ones of tried value. 
' ' Robert Elsmere " is a case in point. The book 
is simply a dressing-up in popular, narrative style, 
of the stalest and shallowest rationalistic objections 
to Christianity. Great was the commotion which 
it excited ; dire were the prophecies of the ruin 
which it would accomplish in the church ! But 
lo ! that wonderful book, which was so vociferously 
praised, and which was to empty all our churches, 
is now a drug in the market ; and some time ago I 
saw a great stack of copies surmounted by a placard 
bearing the inscription : " ' Robert Elsmere ' and a 



SOME NEW THING. 27 

Cake of Soap for 25 cents ; " and the salesman told 
me that he could not get rid of the book even at 
that price. Go into any public library, and you 
will find that the new and silly modern society 
novels are soiled and worn by frequent reading, 
while the world's really valuable books stand upon 
the shelves unsoiled, save by the dust which has 
had ample time to accumulate upon them since 
they were last called for. 

We see it in science, in the haste with which 
new theories are accepted and promulgated as 
facts. Indeed, no matter how wild a theory is, 
there are always multitudes who are ready to seize 
it, and loudly to proclaim that all existing institu- 
tions must be reorganized in harmony with it. Some 
one asked me the other day, ' ' Why is it that the 
majority of scientific men are not Christians ? " 
The question is based upon a false assumption. 
The majority of scientific men are Christians. Our 
scientific men are, as a rule, the professors of 
science in our colleges and universities, and nine 
tenths of them are, and by the charters of their 
institutions must be, Christians. The greatest 
scientists the world has known have been disciples 
of Christ. Witness Copernicus, Kepler, Newton, 
Bayle, Cuvier, Faraday, Herschell, Brewster, Max- 
well, and many others. At a recent convention of 
scientific men, the proceedings were opened with 
prayer, and a daily prayer-meeting was maintained 



28 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

by the delegates, a large majority of whom were 
Christians. The greatest and best men of our own 
as of past ages have been Christian men. Every 
member of the present Supreme Court of the 
United States is a Christian. Gladstone declares 
— and his testimony outweighs that of a host of 
others — that "neither the highest poetry nor the 
highest philosophy can now exist in separation 
from that new conception of the relations between 
God and man which Christianity has supplied." 
And he adds, that of the sixty master minds with 
whom he has come in contact during his long public 
life, and who have moulded the affairs of the 
modern world, all but five were Christians. 

We are sometimes told that there is a conflict 
between science and religion. It is a mistake. 
There is no conflict between science and religion. 
Indeed, Christianity has been the mother of all the 
science there is, has founded and maintained the 
institutions in which the science is taught, and has 
furnished, and is to-day furnishing, the men who pre- 
side over those institutions. Those who believe that 
the majority of scientific men are not Christians, 
have been deceived by the vociferous clamor of a 
comparatively small number of scientific men, who 
make up for the paucity of their numbers by the pro- 
digiousness of their noise, and who resemble nothing 
else so much as the "three Tooley Street tailors," 
who issued a proclamation commencing, ' ' We, the 



SOME NEW THING. 29 

people of England." The most eminent among 
them is Professor Huxley. A minister's opinion of 
him might not be considered valuable, but listen 
to the opinion of the Duke of Argyle, one of the 
foremost thinkers of the modern world. Speak- 
ing of Professor Huxley, he says : ' ' Loud and con- 
fident in matters in which both he and we are 
profoundly ignorant, we see him hardly less bois- 
terous in asserting ignorance where the materials 
of knowledge lie abundant to our hands. We have 
seen his canons of criticism — how rude and undis- 
cerning ; his claim for the physical science — how 
inflated ; his own dealings with one of them — how 
shallow and how dogmatic." Talk about the big- 
otry of theology ! The bigotry of some of these 
agnostic infidels would make Torquemada turn 
green with envy if he could witness it. ' ' What is 
an agnostic ? " Burdette represents a small boy as 
asking, who was reading something by Huxley. 
"An agnostic," replied Uncle George, "is a man 
who loudly declares that he knows nothing, and 
gets mad and abuses you if you believe him. He 
says he does n't know anything, but he really be- 
lieves he knows everything. " 

We see this same craving for new things in every- 
day life, in the restless moving of people from place 
to place, in the frequency of business changes, in 
the small talk of society, in the rage for specu- 
lation. It seems to be the great object in life of 



30 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

many people to devise something novel, " some- 
thing we've never had before," — the utility of the 
thing devised being usually a secondary considera- 
tion. 

And we see it especially in religion. Many peo- 
ple do not like the old ideas of sin and atonement, 
of regeneration and sovereignty. They want some- 
thing new, and the minister who gratifies them is 
sure to have a large, though unsubstantial following. 
Multitudes are hurried hither and thither by their 
craving for change. It may be said of them in 
a sense which the inspired writer did not contem- 
plate, that ''here they have no continuing city." 
Their religious convictions are those of the last 
book they have read or the last person they have 
talked with. They have no settled ideas of truth. 
They are " spending their time in nothing else, but 
either to tell, or to hear some new thing." Some 
people lament the credulity of faith, but they 
might more profitably lament the credulity of skepti- 
cism. Men who will not believe the plainest and 
most clearly established facts of Christianity, almost 
fall over each other in their eagerness to accept 
anti-Christian theories which involve ten times more 
serious difficulties than the doctrines of Christian- 
ity. They stand like eaglets, opening their mouths 
at every passing shadow or slight noise, and ready 
to swallow with avidity whatever may be thrown 



SOME NEW THING. 31 

into them. Men and brethren, there is danger in 
this tendency. Athens was never so degenerate, 
never so effeminate, never so despicable, as when 
her citizens "spent their time in doing nothing 
else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing. " 
Suffer me in conclusion to make two additional 
remarks : First, a disposition to undervalue estab- 
lished ideas or institutions is a sign of a weak mind. 
A misconception is prevalent at this point. There 
are some, particularly among the young, who say 
that they will not accept anything which they have 
not personally investigated and found to be true ; 
and they pride themselves upon that position, and 
deem it an evidence of intellectual strength and in- 
dependence. As a matter of fact, it is simply an 
evidence of intellectual conceit and moral debility. 
Belief is normal to sense and health ; unbelief is 
abnormal to both. He is not a wise man who as- 
sumes that all who " have lived before him were 
either ignorant or foolish, and that wisdom ap- 
peared in the world at the moment he was ushered 
into it. It is sheer folly to put an interrogation 
point after all the truths in the horizon till you have 
examined them for yourselves. Has the world 
learned nothing in all these thousands of years ? 
Has it proved nothing to be true ? Does the en- 
dorsement of ages create no favorable presump- 
tion ? Of course, investigate for yourselves as soon 



32 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

as possible and as profoundly as possible. Chris- 
tianity does not demand blind faith. It is not afraid 
of examination. It has stood the questionings 
of nineteen hundred years, and it can probably 
stand yours. But pending such investigation, you 
will do well to assume the truthfulness of that 
which the world has long held to be true. A sen- 
sible man will no more refuse to become a Christian 
because he has not had time to investigate for him- 
self the history and claims of Christianity, than he 
will refuse to become a citizen of the country in 
which he was born and reared, until he has satisfied 
himself by years of study that the institutions of 
that country are better than the institutions of 
other countries. He who declines to avail himself 
of an electric car, because he has not yet learned 
what electricity is, is not a wise man, but a fool. 

Secondly, in this restless age, we need a progress- 
ive conservatism, a willingness to accept the new 
when it is true, but a holding fast to the old which 
has demonstrated its right to be. Why, the sub- 
lime truths of the world are old ! The sovereignty 
and fatherhood of God, the inspiration of the 
Bible, the Holy Spirit's work and power, — these 
and kindred truths are not new. This Gospel which 
we preach, and in which lies the hope of the race, is 
not a new Gospel. It has been in the world nearly 
two thousand years. It has been preached amid 



SOME NEW THING. 33 

the snows of Greenland and in the jungles of Africa ; 
on the steppes of Asia and in the valleys of South 
America. It has rescued millions from selfishness 
and sin, from temporal and eternal ruin. It has 
assuaged earth's sorrows. It has given scope and 
dignity to human life. It has filled dying hours 
with joy and peace. It has been, and it is, the 
mightiest of agencies for the saving and uplifting of 
a lost and dying race. And we love it because it is 
old, because time has not been able to weaken it or 
exposure to tarnish it, — because all the attacks of 
earth and hell have not been able to overthrow it. 
It stands before us after the lapse of all these tu- 
multuous centuries, still fadeless in beauty, majes- 
tic in strength, and imperishable in vitality. 

That Gospel I declare unto you. I have no 
other. I want no other. I declare it boldly, be- 
cause it has been tested by time and found to be 
true. I proclaim it to you as the solution, and the 
only solution, of the problems of society and gov- 
ernment ; as the adequate instrument for the re- 
generation of the world ; as the sure salvation of 
all those who put their trust in it. Yes, it is the 
old Gospel, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that the 
world needs. It is a story of pathos unspeakable, 
of love most wondrous, — a story fraught with 
sweetest music to my ears. In the hours of my 
soul's need, tell me not of some new thing, but — 
3 



34 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

"Tell me the old, old story 

Of unseen things above, 
Of Jesus and his glory, 

Of Jesus and his love. 
Tell me the story simply, 

As to a little child ; 
For I am weak and weary 

And helpless and defiled. 

" Tell me the story slowly, 

That I may take it in — 
That wonderful redemption, 

God's remedy for sin ! 
Tell me the story often, 

For I forget so soon ! 
The ' early dew ' of morning 

Has passed away at noon ! 

" Tell me the story softly, 

With earnest tones, and grave ; 
Remember ! I'm the sinner 

Whom Jesus came to save. 
Tell me that story always 

If you would really be 
In any time of trouble — 

A comforter to me. 

"Tell me the same old story, 

When you have cause to fear 
That this world's empty glory 

Is costing me too dear. 
Yes, and when that world's glory 

Is dawning on my soul, 
Tell me the old, old story : 

« Christ Jesus makes thee whole. : 




REV. E. S. CHAPMAN, J). />. 



TOO BUSY. 



BY REV. E. S. CHAPMAN, D. D. 
Delivered at the First Presbyterian Church, East Oakland, California. 



And as thy servant was busy here and there, he was gone. 
i Kings 20: 40. 

It is not because we are too stupid, or too lazy, 
but because we are too busy, that we neglect life's 
most important duties. We are busy people, and 
we live in a busy age. Our almost measureless 
achievements do not keep pace with our desires 
and aspirations. Our fathers could ride content- 
edly in ox-carts, but we fret at the delays of the 
lightning express. We are doing many things all 
at once, and trying to do many more. ' ' Careful 
and troubled about many things, " we leave undone 
the things of greatest importance. 

The unsaved man is too busy with the things of 
this life to give attention to the things of the life to 
come ; too busy in caring for his body to secure 
the salvation of his immortal soul ; too busy with 
stocks and bonds and earthly goods to lay up for 
himself treasures in Heaven. He is not an idler. 

[35] 



36 PA CIF1C CO A S T PULPIT. 

Far from it. He is a most arduous toiler in life's 
tedious activities. He toils till he is weary, and 
toils when he should be at rest. Head and hand 
and heart are heavily taxed, and each responds to 
the call with hearty cheerfulness, and shrinks not 
from hardship or discouragement. He is also an 
effective toiler. 

" Each morning sees some task begun, 
Each evening sees its close." 

He watches the seasons, the markets, and the 
indications of future demands and supplies. He 
sows at the best time, and reaps a plentiful har- 
vest. He buys and sells wisely and receives large 
profits. He guards against calamity by prudent 
forethought, and mends every breach before serious 
evils are possible. In the brightness and beauty of 
the summer, he provides for the dreary and deso- 
late winter ; and while securely sheltered from the 
winter's storm, he prepares for the activities of 
milder days. It is his purpose to attend faithfully 
to all matters requiring his attention ; he does 
not intend to neglect any. He does not mean to 
neglect his eternal interest ; he has many times 
promised himself and others to speedily return to 
God, and secure eternal life — but he is so very 
busy ! he has so much to do that the ' ' one thing 
needful " is utterly neglected. And thus the years 
come and go, and he remains unsaved ! 



TOO BUSY. 37 



Such men are before me at this moment, and as 
they hear these words, they confess their applica- 
tion to themselves. They do not mean to be lost, 
but they are too busy to be saved, — too busy keep- 
ing above the waters to get into the life-boat and be 
borne safely beyond the destroying waves ; too busy 
watching the forked flames and curling smoke, to 
escape from the consuming fires ; too busy to be 
saved ! Only think of it ! Too busy to love and 
obey God ; too busy to love and trust the Lord 
Jesus Christ ! 

The unsaved woman is too much occupied with 
the cares of her home and family to make her 
peace with God and prepare for Heaven. With 
cooking and cleaning and mending, with nursing 
and teaching and governing, with calling and re- 
ceiving and entertaining, with parties and balls and 
theaters — with all these and a thousand other 
kindred engagements and duties — how can she 
find time to be saved? If she only had a little 
leisure — only a little release from these ceaseless 
calls of duty — she might give attention to the 
interests of her soul. But she is too busy ! Yes, 
a wife, a mother, a rational, intelligent woman is 
too busy to give attention to religion. She means 
to do it, but so many things crowd upon her atten- 
tion and tax her energies, that days and weeks pass 
by, and weeks and months multiply into years, and 
Christ and Heaven are neglected. Her heart is 



38 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

like the inn at Bethlehem, where there was ' ' no 
room " for the infant Saviour. She would receive 
him, but there is "no room." She does not intend 
to reject him, but she * ' really cannot give attention 
to such matters." She is too busy! too busy to 
yield her affections to One who is ' ' the fairest 
among ten thousand," and " altogether lovely." 

Christian parents are many times too busy to 
attend to the religious instruction and training of 
their children. There was a time in human history 
when the head of the family was its priest, and 
religious instruction and religious services held the 
first place in every godly household. Nothing was 
permitted to crowd out family instruction and cult- 
ure in the truth and service of God. It is no 
wonder that from such families there should arise 
characters like Moses, and Samuel, and John the 
Baptist, and Timothy. But in many homes of 
to-day the family altar is unknown, and careful, 
systematic instruction in divine truth is utterly 
neglected. Many children of professed Christian 
parents never heard the voice of either father or 
mother in prayer ! Can this be true ? Yes, O 
yes, sadly, deplorably true ! Many who are now 
children in our Christian families will never be per- 
mitted in after years to rejoice in the strength 
which comes from early religious culture, nor call 
to remembrance the hallowed associations and in- 
fluences of the family altar. They are being delib- 



TOO BUSY. 39 



erately and cruelly robbed of their priceless heritage 
by those who are responsible for their existence in 
the world, and who have taken upon themselves 
the vows of Christian parentage. 

No words can describe the losses they are thus 
sustaining. The sweet remembrances of home, 
with all its divine atmosphere, and its blissful ex- 
periences, are of more value to us in the struggles 
of life than all the mines of wealth and tomes of 
ancient lore. With such remembrances the child of 
parental faithfulness passes safely over raging seas, 
and through dark and stormy nights, and anchors 
at last securely in the harbor of endless rest. Why, 
then, should any ' professed Christian — knowing 
the fierceness of life's battle, and the value of relig- 
ious instruction and culture in the days of childhood 
— why should any Christian father or mother fail 
to afford their children this great blessing ? Do 
they not love their children ? Certainly they do. 
No one would question that. Have they not en- 
gaged to rear them ' ' in the nurture and admoni- 
tion of the Lord " ? They have, in the most solemn 
and impressive services of God's house. Are not 
family worship and religious instruction included in 
the baptismal obligations of Christian parents ? 
Unquestionably they are, and are so regarded by 
those who assume the solemn obligations of Chris- 
tian parentage. 

Why, then, are there so many Christian homes 



40 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

without a family altar, and so many professed 
Christian parents who never pray with or instruct 
their children in Bible truth ? Why is it ? They 
are too busy ! Fathers are in too great haste to 
reach the place of business or of labor, to begin the 
day upon their knees before a Throne of grace, and 
they are too weary at night, or subject to too many 
interruptions, to close the day with fitting family 
devotions. Mothers are so sorely pressed with 
cares and labors that they do not attend to these 
important matters ; and besides, the children are 
so busy with their studies, or with the claims of 
society, or with some plans of pleasure, that wor- 
ship and religious culture are crowded out ! Too 
busy for family worship ! Too busy to instruct 
their own offspring in the way of life and salvation ! 
Only once — and for so short a time — is the child 
in the parents' hands ' ' as clay in the hands of the 
potter," and then those parents are too busy with 
other and minor matters, to mould and shape their 
characters for Heaven and eternal joy ! I do not 
say with whom, of those who hear me, this is the 
case ; God knows, and so do you. 

Many Sunday-school teachers are too busy to 
make the necessary preparation for their great 
work. It is not because they have been idle dur- 
ing the days and nights of the week that they are 
so poorly prepared to instruct those under their 
care in the Sunday-school. They have not been 



TOO BUSY. 41 



idle ; they have been busy ; busy with a thousand 
cares and duties which have occupied their time 
and crowded out interest in the Sunday-school 
lesson. Hence they appear before their classes un- 
prepared to instruct them in the word of eternal 
truth, and lead them to Jesus, or build them up in 
Him. They are sadly conscious of their weakness, 
and, in a measure, realize their own fault in the 
matter. It was not their purpose to neglect such 
a sacred trust, but other things have received their 
attention and this has been crowded out. There 
are others who devote so much attention to the 
letter of the word, that its spirit is almost wholly 
neglected. Facts and names and dates and texts 
are memorized and drilled upon, and the heart of 
the scholar remains untouched, and the soul un- 
saved. Plans to secure regularity and punctuality 
of attendance and commendable deportment in 
school, tax heart and brain to the exclusion of 
pra) T er and effort to win the heart to the Saviour, 
and build up a noble Christian character. Too 
busy with the means to give attention to the 
end. 

Many Christian workers are so busy with the 
work of sociables, entertainments, and lectures 
that they forget that all this is only to win souls to 
Christ, and to build up His kingdom in the hearts 
of men. Far be it from me to speak any word or 
cherish any thought in disparagement of these, or 



42 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

of their arduous labor of love. Let my right hand 
forget her cunning, before I forget or fail to appre- 
ciate the wearisome services of those who are 
engaged in these activities of the church. But I 
must be faithful to warn as well as to commend 
and encourage ; and there is very great danger of 
utterly losing sight of, and interest in, the real end 
and purpose of our efforts, in our most enthusiastic 
use of the means to that end. We may lose all 
true spirituality while we are wearing ourselves out 
in church services. 

* We may be so very busy, even with what we call 
church work, that we neglect our own spiritual 
culture and growth in grace. We may be work- 
ing so hard for the church that we forget to read 
and study the holy Scriptures, and neglect secret 
prayer. We may be too busy in minor matters to 
attend to matters of greatest moment. Too busy 
to secure the rest which will enable us to be early 
at the house of God, and wakeful during the hour 
of worship. Too busy to attend the prayer-meet- 
ing. At the lodge, and the meeting of the build- 
ing association ; at the political meeting ; at the 
concert ; but too busy to attend the service of 
prayer. Not too good, or too bad to be there, but 
actually too busy. Too busy to visit that sick 
neighbor, though weeks have passed since he or 
she was shut up in that dark room of pain and 
peril. Too busy to call upon those strangers who 



TOO BUSY. 43 



have moved into the house just across the way. 
They may be church people, and they may not ; 
you ought to know about this, and know if those 
precious children attend Sabbath-school or church. 
You have intended to call, but have been too busy. 
Too busy to form the acquaintance and gain the 
confidence of that young man just from the coun- 
try, though you were told of his coming to the city, 
and said you would hunt him up. Too busy greet- 
ing your next-door neighbor, or some other well- 
known friend who sits near you in church, to speak 
to those strangers who have ventured into the 
house of God. You were not indifferent to their 
presence ; you were all alive with interest, but you 
were busy. Too busy in thinking of the artistic 
rendering of that sacred song, to pray and strive 
that it might reach the heart of some poor, perish- 
ing sinner ! And, because you are thus occupied 
and interested, that song which might have been 
attended by divine power, becomes as a " sounding 
brass or a clanging cymbal." 

And this may be true of every feature of church 
service, and of all classes of church workers. 

The Christian minister may be too busy to do 
any effective work for Christ. Too busy in striving 
to tickle the public ear to think of the sad and 
sinful one who is perhaps hearing his last sermon. 
Too busy striving for his own glory, to glorify his 
Lord and Master. Too busy with social engage- 



44 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

ments to be able to bring beaten oil into the sanct- 
uary of God. Too busy visiting and nurturing 
mature members of the church to be able to visit 
the unsaved and win them to the Saviour. Too 
busy, perhaps, in seeking to keep the church in 
harmony, to have time to nourish and shepherd 
the lambs of the fold, and build them up into vig- 
orous Christian life. Too busy with those who are 
saved, to have time or ability to save those who are 
lost. Too busy in building a new church, and in 
planning and soliciting, and praying for success, to 
be able to secure a revival of religion, and the sal- 
vation of perishing multitudes all around him. O 
righteous God, can this be so ? Those whom thou 
hast sent to rescue the perishing, too busy with 
other matters to be successful in that great work ? 
4 ' As thy servant was busy here and there, he was 
gone ! " Yes, while we are thus busy, the oppor- 
tunity passes forever away. The blessed Saviour 
turns away from the heart at which He has so long 
and so patiently lingered. Lovingly did He plead 
for admittance ; faithfully did He disclose His bleed- 
ing wounds and proffer His divine mercy ; but all 
in vain, for other guests were receiving attention, 
and the needy soul remained in darkness and sin, 
too busy to hear and heed the calls of salvation. 
Until His locks were wet with the dews of the night, 
He tarried and sought admittance to the heart, but 
now He is gone, and the offers of salvation are 



TOO BUSY. 45 



closed. Do you wonder that He goes ? Do you 
not rather wonder that He tarries so long ? Are 
you not filled with amazement that He has not long 
since turned forever away from you ? 

" Behold a stranger at the door, 
He gently knocks, has knocked before. 
Has waited long, is waiting still, 
You treat no other friend so ill. 
O let the dear Saviour come^in, 
He '11 cleanse thy heart from sin, 
O keep Him no more, out at the door, 
But let the dear Saviour come in." 

Soon, ah, soon He will be gone ! He surely will 
not linger to be treated thus. If you are too busy 
to be saved, when He freely offers you salvation, 
what will you receive when He is busy with those 
who desire salvation ? And the tender, inquiring 
boy who waited for your smiles and yielded to your 
influence — is gone. While you were too busy to 
mould and fashion him for Christ, he has gradually 
slipped out of your grasp, and he will never again 
be the tender, susceptible boy he once was. That 
boy is gone ; gone up into riper years, and greater 
strength of character and will. You were then too 
busy to teach him the way of life, he is now too 
busy to be taught. And those boys and girls who 
now gladden your hearts and brighten your homes, 
will all soon be gone. They are even now going 
out into the fierce battle of life ; into the fearful 



46 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

conflict with the powers <of darkness. The mem- 
bers of your Sunday-school class will also soon be 
gone. Some have already passed away, grown out 
of your reach, or gone into eternity. 

And that sick neighbor has gone. He lingered 
long, but death came at last and took him beyond 
your reach. While you were too busy to seek to 
point him to the Friend of sinners, death was very 
busy removing him beyond the offers of salvation. 

And that young man from the country has gone. 
The emissaries of Satan were very busy initiating 
him into the ways of vice, while professed Chris- 
tians were too busy to win him to the Saviour. 

Your unsaved neighbor, your father, your hus- 
band, your son or daughter, — are they gone ? 
Has your opportunity with them passed away ? 

They may not all be reached, even if we do our 
whole duty. But minor matters must not be per- 
mitted to so occupy our thoughts and affections, to 
so tax our efforts, as to leave the stain of their 
blood upon our garments. And this need not be. 
There are no conflicts between human duties. The 
strictest faithfulness to every religious duty and 
trust detracts from no proper service or effort in 
life. Every duty is a religious duty. All things 
should be done for the glory of God, and if this be 
our aim and effort, we will always find time and 
inclination to do that which is of greatest impor- 
tance to His cause and kingdom. But we are too 



TOO BUSY. 47 



prone to permit even trivial matters to crowd out 
of our thoughts matters of supreme importance. 
We do not mean to be unfaithful to any trust, or 
neglectful of any duty, but we become so absorbed 
in what we are doing, so interested and engaged, 
that we do not hear the calls to higher duties, or, 
hearing, we do not heed them. 

Willie was a very kind and obedient boy, whom 
his mother left at home one day, to take charge of 
his little flaxen-haired sister. Many were his ear- 
nest promises that not for one instant would he per- 
mit her to be out of his sight, but at length he 
became so absorbed in mending his kite that he 
did not notice that his little charge had wandered 
out upon the porch at the rear of the house. Pres- 
ently he heard her calling, ' ' Oh, Willie, come here 
quick." " Wait a minute, darling," was his tender 
reply, ' ' brother is very busy. " It was only a few 
minutes until his work was done, but his little 
sister was gone, and her little hat lying at an open 
cistern, explained her earnest call for her brother. 

' ' Willie, my darling boy, what is the matter ? 
where is your little sister ? " * ' O mamma, I was so 
busy mending my kite that I did not miss her until 
she had fallen into the cistern and was drowned." 

"Father, mother, Sunday-schoolteacher, Chris- 
tian worker, minister of the gospel, where are those 
intrusted to your care ? " " O blessed Master, we 
have been so very busy making money, attending 



48 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

to the claims of society, preparing line discourses 
— so very busy that we have forgotten them, and 
they have fallen into ruin and are lost ! " 

What do you think of Willie, my beloved hear- 
ers ? He did not mean to be unfaithful. Neither 
do we. He was not idle nor stupid, he was only 
very busy. So are we. He ought to have been 
busy. So ought we. He ought not to have been 
so absorbed in a trivial matter like mending a kite, 
as to be unfaithful to such a sacred trust. Neither 
ought we. His was a very sacred trust. Ours is 
far more sacred. His unfaithfulness caused a very 
great loss, and a most grievous sorrow. Ours may 
result in infinitely greater evil. He was only a 
little boy. We are mature men and women — Chris- 
tian men and women. His opportunity was passed. 
Ours is not. Let us work ' ' while it is day ; the 
night cometh, when no man can work." 




REV. NG POON CHEW. 



THE CHINESE IN SAN FRANCISCO. 



BY REV. NG POON CHEW. 

An address delivered at a Christian Convention in San Francisco, September, 1892. 



Since the passage of the series of anti-Chinese 
acts by the United States government, the num- 
ber of Chinese in this country has been steadily 
and considerably reduced. Once there were from 
twenty-five to thirty thousand Chinese in this city ; 
now there are somewhat less than fifteen thousand. 

They are found in nearly every trade, working in- 
dustriously and patiently for their livelihood ; sav- 
ing what they can, often very little, to send back 
home for the support of their dependent relatives. 
As a class, the Chinese hate to be idle ; they must 
and will work whether they earn much or little. 

In their lodgings they are generally dirty, as one 
will see when he takes a walk through China-town ; 
but in their persons they are comparatively clean. 
They are living closely together on account of the 
high rent of rooms in that quarter. 

The Chinese are very superstitious. They are 
so brought up from their childhood. From their 
standpoint, they are religious, especially their 

[49] 



50 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

women. There is not a heathen home in China- 
town which does not contain a number of altars 
dedicated to the worship of their numerous gods and 
departed friends. They have about fifteen public 
temples among them, of different sizes, which are 
supported by their pious patrons. The temple 
keeper has to pay a large sum of money into the 
treasury of the temple before he can take charge 
of it ; and he gets his return by compelling every 
worshiper to buy offerings from him alone, for 
which he charges an exorbitant price. 

Theoretically, there are two distinct religious 
sects in China-town, Buddhist and Taoist ; the 
former came from India, the latter is of native 
origin. But practically there is only one mixed 
religion. They do not draw any distinction now ; 
one may be at the same time a follower of Con- 
fucius, a believer in Buddhism, and an adherent of 
Taoism. 

All the Chinese sincerely believe in the immor- 
tality of the soul, and future reward and punish- 
ment according to deeds done in this life ; but, 
alas, they do not seem to make any preparation 
for that life or to make any effort to seek out the 
way to escape that punishment, while living. They 
are either ignorant as to the way of preparation or 
indifferent to their native convictions. 

They make offerings to the dead, periodically, 
both at home and at the grave, in the form of meat, 



THE CHINESE TV SAN-FRAMCISCO. 51 

paper clothing, and money, believing that the spir- 
its of the dead need these as well as the living. 
In accordance with this belief, the Chinese always 
take the remains of their dead friends with them 
back to China so they can worship them there. 

The Chinese are great lovers of games, either for 
pleasure or money. It is very hard to keep them 
from gambling. There are many gambling places 
among them, but not as many as there used to be. 
If the officers would do their duty, these could be 
stopped. 

The highbinder societies are formed for mutual 
protection and blackmailing purposes. There are 
many of them in the Chinese quarter. Nearly all 
the crimes committed in that quarter are done by 
the members of these infernal societies, who are 
enabled to escape justice by the laxness of Ameri- 
can laws, and unprincipled lawyers. Such societies 
could not so openly exist for a day in China ; every 
member would be immediately beheaded when 
caught, and no mercy would ever be shown to such 
miserable wretches under the Chinese laws. 

The Chinese, as a race, have very little appetite 
for liquor ; very few, if any, ever get drunk. I 
have never seen a drunken Chinaman in all my 
life. Though the Chinese do not use liquor to any 
extent, they have a substitute for it, namely, opium, 
which is very murderous to the Chinese. It is the 
devil's curse and device for creating misery. In 



52 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

my humble opinion, it is as bad as whisky in this 
land ; but some say it is not. Well, in one sense, 
perhaps, it is not so bad, because when a drunken 
white man comes home, he abuses his children and 
kicks his wife, but when a Chinese opium fiend 
comes home, his wife kicks him, which is much 
better. 

This very day there are from eight to ten million 
human wretches in China, smoking this poisonous 
drug ; and there are more than sixty million living 
souls suffering directly and indirectly from the use 
of this infernal extract. It is used among all classes 
and sexes ; you can point them out by their con- 
sumptive appearance. 

O how many bright and promising young men, 
the only joy, hope, and comfort of their aged par- 
ents, have been wrecked and hastened to an un- 
timely grave by the use of this drug ! 

After one has acquired the habit of using opium, 
there is very little hope for his reform ; he goes on 
from bad to worse, until he is unfit for any vocation. 
He requires more time to smoke and to sleep off its 
effect, than to work. 

But how came opium to be among the Chinese ? 
Did our land first produce it ? or did we, the Chinese, 
invent it ? — No, no ! ten thousand times, no ! It 
was produced by the Christian English in India, 
and forced upon us heathen Chinese with powder 



THE CHINESE IX SAM FRANCISCO. 53 

and balls, killing us by the thousands, and ruining 
us by the millions with its poison. 

Our good and beloved emperor made no resist- 
ance but was overcome by the superior forces of the 
English, and compelled to let his country be over- 
flowed with this death-dealing drug. And then he 
exclaimed at the close of the opium war, ' ' I know 
this will kill my poor people by the millions, — 
my poor people, my poor children ! " Poor man ! 
he did fully see its deadly effect before he died ; 
for his own son was among the first victims of 
opium ; and O, what a field of blood and what a 
world of iniquity will be revealed before the judg- 
ment-seat of God, to those men, who, to satisfy 
their own selfish end, forced this curse upon our 
country. 

The English government opium factories in India 
are producing a fearful amount of this drug every 
year. They ship about eleven million pounds to 
China annually — enough to kill ever)' human be- 
ing in all Asia and Europe, if taken internally. 

If it were not for the devilish actions of the 
English government, we would be to-day free from 
this vice, and you would not read in your daily 
papers about the opium dens and opium fiends 
among us. 

As the time allotted me is limited, I do not 
wish to go on any longer with this mournful tale of 



54 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

the dire consequences of opium ; for they will only 
shock your feelings, although not half has been told. 
God only knows all the sad details. 

Let us now take a glance at the bright and hope- 
ful side, and see what the Church of Christ has 
done for the Chinese here. 

The Presbyterian, the Methodist, the Baptist, the 
Congregational, and the Episcopalian churches, are 
carrying on good and successful work among them. 
There are schools connected with mission churches, 
day schools for children and women, where English 
and Chinese are taught ; and evening schools for 
men, where English alone is taught. There are 
now about three hundred Christian Chinese in 
San Francisco who are leading a life consistent 
with their profession. This number does not rep- 
resent all that have been converted by these mis- 
sions since their first operation ; for some have 
gone home to their newly found Saviour, and many 
have left here for their native land, where they are 
now preaching the glad tidings of the Gospel to 
their fellow-men by words and by deeds. 

Many things have to be overcome and endured 
before a Chinaman can be a Christian. He has 
to discard all the former beliefs and superstitions 
and ancestral worship which every Chinaman holds 
dear ; and in addition he has to suffer ill-treatment 
and separation from his former friends and rela- 
tives. 



THE CHINESE IN SAN ERANCISCO. 55 

The converts here are striving very hard for the 
conversion of their countrymen in China. They 
are not only waiting but also working anxiously for 
the fulfillment of that prophecy in Isaiah, ' ' Behold, 
these shall come from far ; and, lo, these from the 
north, and from the west ; and these from the land 
of Sinim." 

They have founded different missionary societies, 
and pledged to give so much each month to sup- 
port the native missionaries employed by them in 
China, and they have also raised large sums of 
money to build churches in different districts of 
Canton Province. Several churches have been 
already built and supported wholly by the Christian 
Chinese in this country. 

There cannot be more earnestness, pleasure, and 
self-denial manifested anywhere than at the mis- 
sion meetings when discussing the building of new 
churches in China. Every one present would give 
encouragement, not only with words but also with 
money. Some would stand up and pledge their 
help by giving a whole month's wages ; some would 
pledge two months', and some even three months' 
wages. 

The Christian Chinamen, converted in this coun- 
try, who go back to China, are among the best, 
the most faithful, patient, consistent, and energetic 
Christians to be found anywhere. 

The conversion of the Chinese in this country is 



56 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

a great factor toward the conversion of China. 
Therefore the churches should do their duty more 
earnestly and faithfully in converting these strangers 
in their midst. 

So, friends, come and help us, and the cause of 
Christ among us, with your fervent prayers, with 
the wealth God has given you, and with your sym- 
pathy, that all of us from the land of Sinim may be 
instructed in the knowledge of Christ, and with 
gladness serve the God you adore. 




REV. R. F. COYLE, D. D. 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES US TO BELIEVE 
ABOUT THE BIBLE. 



BY REV. R. F. COYLE, D. D. , 

Pastor First Presbyterian Church, Oakland, California. 



Making the word of God of none effect, through your 
tradition, which ye have delivered. Mark 7 ." 13. 

And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake 
unto you while I was yet with you, that all things must be 
fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in the 
prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me. Luke 24 : 44. 

Think not that I am ccme to destroy the law, or the 
prophets ; I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For 
verily I say unto yon, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot 
or one title shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be 
fulfilled. Matt. 5 : 17, 18. 

The battle for the truth never ceases to rage. 
For those who are in earnest there is no discharge 
in that war. The contestants are always in the 
field, and the fight is always on. They change 
their tactics and shift their positions from time to 
time, but there is no surcease of conflict. A few 
years ago the tides of battle surged about the 
Christ. The best scholarship and the keenest 
criticism of the century were enlisted, and when 
the atmosphere cleared as the struggle subsided, 

[571 



58 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

there He stood, as always, mighty to save, the 
Wonderful, the everlasting Father, the Prince of 
Peace. 

To-day the Bible is the center around which the 
contest gathers. The rattle of intellectual artillery 
is heard all along the line, and splendid flashes of 
rhetorical fireworks disturb the sky. Even our 
secular papers have taken sides, and, as usual, 
have decided the matter with characteristic dis- 
patch. It would be amusing, perhaps, if it were 
not so absurd, to see with what an infallible air 
they dispose of the most serious problems that can 
engage the thought of man. In this case, as might 
have been expected, their conclusions are in favor 
of the critics, who, in dealing with the Bible, use 
the penknife of Jehudi. As to the issue of the 
battle we have no doubt whatever. The Book will 
stand in its integrity. It is an anvil that has worn 
out a great many hammers. It will come out of 
this, as it has come out of every previous fire of 
conflict, unscathed and entire, not weakened, but 
strengthened and glorified by the ordeal. In the 
meanwhile it will serve to plant our feet more 
squarely on the Rock, and give firmer fiber to our 
faith to turn from men and warring schools to see 
what Jesus Christ teaches us to believe about the 
Book. 

Before proceeding to this, however, it may be 
well to ask whether Christ is a competent judge in 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES ABOUT THE BIBLE. 59 

this case ? Is He by grasp of mind, by spiritual 
insight, by purity of life, and poise of character, 
qualified to sit in judgment upon the Book which 
we regard as Holy Writ ? To ask the question is 
to answer it. The marvelous reach of His intellect 
is everywhere seen in His words and sayings. His 
mind penetrated at once to the very heart of things 
and seized upon ultimate principles. To be im- 
pressed w T ith the unapproachable quality of His 
mental caliber it is only necessary to study His 
answers to certain questions that were put to Him. 
These answers were, in every case, extemporane- 
ous, unpremeditated, but they were so complete, 
so crushing, so profound, and yet so plain and 
pointed, that they effectually silenced His enemies, 
and those enemies were among the keenest and 
most able men of their day. For three years they 
exercised all their ingenuity to entangle Him ; they 
brought forward every difficulty they could think of 
in the Scriptures, but His replies were so clear, so 
convincing, so severe upon themselves, that it is 
said, ' ' They durst not any more ask Him any 
questions." 

No matter how high, no matter how deep, the 
ethical problem, Jesus was at home in it. He 
dealt with it like one who saw it in all its bearings, 
near and remote. He had read the Scriptures, 
and read human life, and penetrated both to the 
very core. His power of condensation was super- 



60 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

human. He could crowd a whole world of truth 
into a little sentence of a few simple words. Now 
all this means transcendent, intellectual force. 

As to His spiritual insight I need not trouble 
you to speak a word. Every reader of the Gospels 
knows how He saw into the very depths. When 
He turned to the law and the prophets, He saw not 
the letter, not books and chapters, but the spiritual 
truth behind. So in reading human life. He saw 
at once the motive, the spirit by which men were 
actuated, and not that which was external and 
mechanical. 

And where else will you find such moral in- 
tegrity ? His life has been scrutinized for nineteen 
centuries by friends and foes alike, and not a flaw 
has ever yet been detected. ' ' Which of you con- 
vinceth me of sin ? " His own challenge to the 
Scribes and Pharisees has never yet been an- 
swered. Out of all the fires of criticism, out of the 
crucible of ages of intense investigation, that life 
has come, unsullied as a sunbeam, pure as the 
great white Throne. To all this add the fact of 
His perfect poise of character, His evenness of 
temper in every storm that beat about Him, His 
calmness and patience under abuse, the absolute 
impartiality of His judgment, and I think you will 
agree with me that He is abundantly qualified to 
teach us concerning the Bible. We are prepared, 
therefore, to sit at His feet to learn what He has 
to say about the Book. 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES ABOUT THE BIBLE. 61 

At the outset, then, He teaches us to believe 
that the Bible is the word of God. He so charac- 
terizes the entire Old Testament. He sharply 
rebukes the Scribes and Pharisees for making the 
word of God of none effect through their traditions, 
and by that word is clearly meant the Holy Script- 
ures, so far as they were then written. He never 
questioned the sacred oracles, as He had learned 
them in the home of Joseph and Mary. He lived 
in them. He taught them. He bowed before 
their divine authority. He confounded the Phari- 
sees and silenced the Sadducees by quoting from 
Moses; and, in John 10:35, making the word of 
God synonymous with Scripture, He solemnly de- 
clares that the Scripture cannot be broken. It is 
the fashion now-a-days, in certain quarters, to rule 
out some of the alleged writings of Moses, which 
comprise the first five books of the Bible, as not 
being part of the inspired record ; but Jesus quotes 
from every one of them, and always as the word of 
God. So, also, he quotes from Samuel, from 
Kings, from Chronicles, from the Psalms, from the 
prophets, and puts them in the same category as 
belonging to the word of God. Now, Jesus had 
studied these writings profoundly in His Nazareth 
home. He had brought to bear upon them all of 
His peerless powers, and mastered them, as His 
facility in quotation shows. Hence he must have 
known whether they were true or false, and espe- 
cially, since He was the Son of God. But if they 



62 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULP1 T. 

are false, if they are not the word of God, could 
He have given them His unqualified endorsement 
consistently with His pure and holy life ? Would a 
person of such exalted character have resorted to 
the poor trick of quoting from spurious scriptures 
to fortify His own claims ? Would He, who calls 
Himself the Truth, and who has a right to that 
pre-eminence, have put His imprimatur upon 
documents which were counterfeit ? To me at 
least, such a thing seems not only incredible, but 
absurd, and I leave the critics to wrestle with it, 
while I stand with Jesus Christ. What He quotes 
as the word of God I believe that you and I are 
warranted in fearlessly quoting as the word of 
God, also. 

He does not teach any particular theory of in- 
spiration. He does not tell us how these writings 
of Moses and the prophets were inspired, whether 
by dictation or illumination, or a certain superin- 
tendency which saved the authors from error, or 
whether the gold was supplied by the Holy Spirit, 
and the moulds by man. All such nice questions 
as these were left to human wisdom. He simply 
tells us that these Scriptures are the word of God, 
and His teaching ought to have its proper weight. 
He claims divine inspiration for His own words. 
Thus: "The word which ye hear is not mine, but 
the Father's, who sent me." And in like manner 
He teaches us the inspiration of the Apostles. He 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES ABOUT THE BIBLE. 63 

promises them the Spirit, who, He declares, will 
"guide then into all truth," and "bring all things 
to their remembrance." Hence He teaches us to 
believe that both the Old and New Testaments are 
the word of God. 

Passing from this, let me ask you to notice in the 
next place that he makes himself tJie center upon 
which all lines of Holy Writ converge. In John 5 : 39, 
he says of the Scriptures : ' ' These are they which 
testify of me." And in the 46th verse of the same 
chapter He speaks as follows : ' ' For if ye believed 
Moses ye would believe me, for he wrote of me." 
Again, in the 24th of Luke, beginning at the 44th 
verse, he says to his Apostles : ' ' These are the 
words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with 
you, that all things must be fulfilled which were 
written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, 
and in the psalms, concerning me. Then opened 
he their understanding that they might understand 
the Scriptures, and said unto them, Thus it is writ- 
ten, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, and to 
rise from the dead the third day ; and that repent- 
ance and remission of sins should be preached in 
his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusa- 
lem." This is certainly remarkable language. Re- 
member that it comes from the lips of the Son of 
God. He calmly and deliberately puts Himself 
forward as constituting the very sum and substance 
of law and prophecy and psalm. In terms too 



64 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

plain to be misunderstood He affirms that the 
Scriptures bear "one common, supreme testimony, 
not to a shadowy hope, not to a mere human pos- 
tulate of faith, but to a Person, the Saviour, who 
should live and die and rise again for the salvation 
of man," and that Saviour is Himself. 

Thus the Word of God is a wondrous house of 
many mansions, of which Christ is the key. With- 
out Him its treasures are locked up, they are hidden, 
and no human ingenuity can steal its way into their 
untold wealth. With Him every door in its sixty- 
six apartments can be opened and their precious 
contents brought to light. Apart from Him the 
Bible is a sealed book. Its types, its symbols, its 
sacrifices, its prophecies, and many of its historic 
allusions are incomprehensible. They are like the 
hieroglyphics on some ancient obelisk. They evi- 
dently mean something, but, without the key, no- 
body can tell what. So, without Christ, the Word 
of God is beyond our ken. We have types with no 
answering antitype. Shadows pointing to no ex- 
planatory light, hints of a Coming One that only 
mock and baffle the searcher after truth, prophecies 
that never issue in fulfillment. Many a devout 
student has found that he could make nothing out 
of these Scriptures until he began their interpreta- 
tion from Christ as the center. As soon as he did 
that, he was amazed and delighted to see how the 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES ABOUT THE BIBLE. 65 

Book yielded up its secrets and how the light fell 
upon its dark places. It used to be said in olden 
times that every road led to Rome ; and it is true 
now, and always, that every pathway in Holy Writ, 
whether marked out by Moses or the prophets, finds 
its center and terminus in Jesus Christ. So He 
taught Himself, and the lesson cannot be too thor- 
oughly written upon our hearts. The scientific 
student who should undertake to interpret the Mis- 
sissippi Valley with the Father of Waters left out, 
would have a task no more difficult, to say the 
least, than would the student who should try to un- 
derstand the Bible with the Lord Jesus left out. 
He is as essential to a correct knowledge of the 
drift and purpose of the Bible as Hamlet is to a 
correct conception of the great tragedy that bears 
his name. 

Moreover, by His own example, he teaches us to 
rest calmly and confidently on the written and in- 
destructible Word of God. His own attitude toward 
this book shows more forcibly than any words 
could, the estimate He puts upon it. His utter- 
ances standing alone, unsupported by His example, 
would have little or no weight ; not enough, cer- 
tainly, to be convincing. But He practiced what 
He preached. If He taught others to confide in 
the Book, He did so Himself most implicitly. If 
He spoke of the Book with the utmost assurance, 
5 



66 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

He trusted it with the utmost assurance. Here, as 
everywhere, there is no disparity between His say- 
ings and doings. 

In the wilderness, when the tempter came and 
exercised all his ingenuity to poison His mind with 
doubt ; when he came with his mouth filled with 
ifs, did Jesus stop to parley ? Did He argue ? 
Did He take refuge in His wit or His genius ? Not 
for a moment. But He said, " It is written." He 
said it three several times, and each time with 
keener accent. He met the enemy with no un- 
tempered blade, but with the sword of the Spirit, 
which is the Word of God. To beat him, and 
scathe him, and hurl him back, He laid hold of this 
battery of heaven and plucked the lightning from 
the skies. There was no questioning the justice 
of the fearful struggle. His energies were not al- 
lowed to evaporate in vague wondering as to why 
it was thus and so. He simply threw Himself 
back upon the Word, and there He rested in calm 
acquiescence with the will of His Father. 

Again, when a certain lawyer came inquiring 
what he should do to inherit eternal life, Jesus did 
not depend upon His own skill and cleverness for 
an answer. He referred him to the Word, and 
said, "How readest thou?" The lawyer quoted 
the well-known passage about love to God and 
love to man, and Jesus said, "Thou hast answered 
right ; this do and thou shalt live. " Scripture was 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES ABOUT THE BIBLE. 67 

to Him the answer to all questions, the solution of 
all problems bearing upon man's relation to his 
neighbor and his God. 

In the most solemn hours of His life, in His con- 
flicts, His trials, His sufferings, the written Word 
was ever on His lips. He said repeatedly that 
things turned out so and so in order that the 
Scriptures might be fulfilled. And when the final 
storm gathered about Him and culminated on the 
Cross, He rested His soul on that Word " amid the 
cyclone of death," and the last sayings He uttered, 
as He hung upon the tree, were quotations from 
the Psalms. If, therefore, the testimony of Jesus, 
embodied both in speech and example, is to be 
relied upon, the Scriptures are the Word of God. 
If we believe Him we must believe them. This 
assertion will bear investigation, and I commend it 
to your most careful and candid consideration. 

Not only, however, does He assure us that the 
Scriptures are the Word of God, and that He is 
their central theme, but that they are to stand. 
In His Sermon on the Mount He says, " Think 
not that I am come to destroy the law, or the 
prophets : I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. 
For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth 
pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from 
the law till all be fulfilled." With still warmer 
emphasis, if possible, He declares in Luke 16 : 17 : 
' ' It is easier for heaven and earth to pass than one 



68 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

tittle of the law to fail." He was not afraid that 
the Book would become obsolete and perish. He 
was not afraid that the world would outgrow it, 
and the wisdom of man supersede it. He took it 
up reverently, and, looking at it, He said, "This 
Book is to abide. Think not that it will ever van- 
ish away and be forgotten," and His faith in its 
staying qualities ought to strengthen ours. 

When the Emperor of Rome was being ferried 
across a certain stormy water, the boatman became 
pale with fright. He thought they were going to 
be swallowed up by the wave, but the Emperor in- 
spired him with courage by saying : ' ' Fear not, 
you carry Csesar. " So, though the storms may 
rage around it and threaten to engulf, this boat of 
Holy Writ will ride the billow and outlive the 
tempest, for it carries the Son of God, whose hand 
is on the storm. 

Out from the Cape of Good Hope there runs into 
the sea a dangerous bar some forty or fifty miles in 
length. The water, we are told, sweeps around it 
with a tremendous swell, making navigation ex- 
tremely perilous at certain seasons of the year. 
Around this cape an East Indiaman, called the 
Lady Holland, was fighting her way in the year 
1830, bound for Hindoostan. For days and days 
clouds filled the sky. Again and again the vessel 
was beaten out of her course. Soundings were 
taken, and the captain found that the ship was 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES ABOUT THE BIBLE. 69 

over the bar. Realizing the peril of her position, 
he was just about to give orders to turn about. But 
it was too late. With an awful crash she struck. 
Her back was broken, and her forepart sank in the 
wild breakers. As Providence would have it, how- 
ever, all on board escaped to a little patch of land 
amid the rocks. Among them was a young man 
from Scotland by the name of Alexander Duff. He 
was going out as a missionary to India. While the 
shipwrecked passengers were huddled together for 
shelter in a wretched little hovel, a sailor, walking 
along the beach, found a Bible cast up high and 
dry. He opened it, and found Alexander Duff's 
name distinctly written in it. Out of a library of 
800 volumes which he was taking to India it was 
the only one saved. What is still more singular, it 
had been packed with the other books, but had 
been carefully wrapped in chamois skin, and was 
not even injured. He took the book, and to the 
drenched and shivering passengers read the 107th 
Psalm. 

The incident made a profound and lasting im- 
pression on the young man's mind. He took it as 
the voice of Providence declaring that the Bible is 
the supreme book for India and for mankind. But 
the significant part of the story for us is the strik- 
ing illustration it gives us of the history of the Bible, 
the experiences through which it has come, the 
storms which it has outlived. To wreck it, to de- 



70 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

stroy it, has been impossible. Men like Gibbon, 
and Hume, and Voltaire, and Paine, and Ingersoll 
have turned all the artillery of their wit, their sat- 
ire, their ridicule and their eloquence upon it, but 
still it stands, as Jesus said. To refute it, to prove 
it unreliable, travelers have searched the ruins of 
ancient cities, like Volney, and mighty scholars 
have ransacked history and science, but still it 
stands. To undermine it and gainsay its claims, 
geologists have digged into the bowels of the earth, 
and astronomers have delved among the stars, but 
still it stands. About fifty years ago the higher 
critics began their attacks. They assaulted it here 
and assaulted it there, now in the Old Testament 
and now in the New, and their assaults have been 
kept up and multiplied from year to year ; but still 
it stands. The half century in which it has sus- 
tained the most determined and skillful assaults 
has been precisely the half century of its greatest 
triumphs. 

Since John wrote on lonely Patmos, and Paul 
wrote in his ''own hired house" in Rome, the 
whole face of the world has been changed, 
turned upside down, empires have fallen and em- 
pires have risen, science and philosophy have 
changed front again and again, and hoary systems 
have dropped from behind the curtains of the past, 
but the Bible stands. Not one jot or tittle of 
God's Word has passed away. Jesus said it would 



WHAT CHRIST TEACHES ABOUT THE BIBLE. 71 

abide, and He knew what He was talking about. 
What He says is worth believing. Celsus was fam- 
ous once, Voltaire was famous once, Bolingbroke 
was famous once. When they opened their mouths, 
it was as though Sir Oracle had spoken. But 
where are their books to-day ? They are either 
long ago out of print, or feeding the moth on dusty 
shelves, or forming buttresses from which the deft 
spider suspends his web, but the Bible stands, and 
was never so widely known, or so deeply loved, or 
so devoutly studied, or so mighty in power as in 
this year of grace 1893. 

Many of the interpretations put upon it by 
schools and commentators are passing away, but 
we need not weep over that. Who cares for the 
scaffolding so long as the building remains ? Let 
it go if its work is done. The building will look 
better and be better without it. Interpretations 
are not sacred. Interpretations are not inspired. 
The scaffolding is useful, but it does not belong to 
the architect's plan. Interpretations are going. 
They have gone in the past, and they will go in 
the future, but what of that, so long as the Book 
interpreted abides ? When the rain comes, and the 
water pours in torrents along the streets, you are 
not afraid that your houses are going to be washed 
away. The filth will go, the rubbish will go, all 
unnecessary accumulations will go, but you are 
glad of that, for it will leave things cleaner and 



72 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

more wholesome. So these showers of investiga- 
tion, and these torrents of criticism that are falling 
upon the Book will, no doubt, sweep away some 
old interpretations which we have loved and to 
which we have clung, but they will leave, not a 
mutilated Bible, not a fragmentary Bible, but the 
complete Bible, as we now have it, more perfectly 
understood and more highly prized than ever. 

We need have no fears for the Book, fellow- 
men. It will stand, for Jesus said so. It can 
never die, for He, its heart, its life, is immortal. 
It will be opposed, it will be attacked with growing 
fierceness as its victories multiply, but, like the 
birds which beat themselves to death against the 
glass globes that surround the electric lights of the 
city, those who assault it will be flung back de- 
feated, baffled, while it shines on with brightening 
ray as the night of time wears toward eternal dawn. 




REV. ARTHUR CROSBY, A. M. 



THE SURE FOUNDATION, AND ITS SEAL. 



BY REV. ARTHUR CROSBY A. M. , 

Late Pastor First Presbyterian Church, San Rafael, and now Principal 
Mt. Tamalpais Military Academy. 



Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having 
this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. 2 Tim. 
2 : iq. 

According to the teaching of Christ and of the 
apostles, there are but two classes of human beings, 
— those who serve God, and those who serve Him 
not ; the citizens of heaven and the citizens of the 
world ; the saved and the lost. 

This distinction the Scriptures insist upon as 
being real, vital, essential. All other principles of 
classification are represented as unimportant and 
superficial. Differences of wealth, of education, of 
race, of color — national and social distinctions — 
are of no account compared with this division be- 
tween saints and sinners, between the friends of 
God and the enemies of God. This, I say, is the 
clear, distinct, oft-repeated teaching of the Bible. 
Indeed, it is upon this theory that Christianity 
exists in the world. 

[73] 



74 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Theoretically the church is organized with sole 
reference to this distinction. The design is that all 
those, and only those who are God's friends should 
be in the church, while all those, and only those 
who are against God should be regarded as belong- 
ing to the world. Practically, however, and as a 
matter of fact, the church contains many who are 
not the Lord's servants, while many who do really 
love and serve Him are still in the ranks of the un- 
converted and unbelieving multitude. But this 
failure of the church to reach its ideal, does not 
interfere with the reality of the distinction which 
the Bible teaches — for * ' the Lord knoweth them 
that are his." It is not given to you or me, or to 
any man, or any body of men to decide who are 
the Lord's and who are not. No session or church 
court, no bishop or house of bishops can determine 
to which class this or that man belongs. Neverthe- 
less, the two classes exist ; and though we may not 
discriminate between them, surely the Searcher of 
Hearts, He to whom all secrets are open, is not 
liable to be mistaken in His judgment. Surely 
' ' the Lord knoweth them that are his. " 

Now let us notice more particularly the principle 
upon which this classification proceeds. Let us try 
to discover what, according to the Bible, is the 
essential distinction between the saint and the 
sinner. And it is especially important in these 
days to get at that essential distinction, and to 



THE SURE FOUNDATION, AND ITS SEAL. 75 

have a clear idea of the real difference between the 
two classes, because, as civilization advances, and 
as social life becomes Christianized, the external 
and apparent marks of this distinction become ob- 
scured or even obliterated. 

Christianity is constantly exerting a powerful in- 
fluence upon the communities in which it has a 
foothold, even upon those persons in the commu- 
nity who do not acknowledge its divine authority, 
or accept its spiritual truths. Many of the bless- 
ings of the religion of Christ are enjoyed by those 
even who scoff at its claims and utterly refuse to 
have anything to do with the church which repre- 
sents it. In spite of themselves, they feel and 
exhibit the indirect effects of its principles and its 
teachings, so that they become moral and law-abid- 
ing, and even virtuous and charitable. They are 
good husbands, and faithful wives, and affectionate 
parents, and excellent citizens, and kindly neigh- 
bors ; and their godless lives are adorned with 
many attractive and graceful forms of refinement. 
The consequence is, that in such a state of society, 
where the outward and visible signs of distinction 
between the Christian and the man of the world 
are lost, the notion is apt to prevail, both in the 
church and in the world, that there is no such 
distinction. 

Then the spiritual vitality of the church is sapped, 
ind the impression grows that religion is no better 



76 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

than respectable morality, and worship becomes a 
mere form. And so, after a time, the fountain 
of spiritual influence being dried, the community 
relapses into the condition which is natural to god- 
less humanity, and the worst vices and immoralities 
begin to appear. 

Now, I say, it is of vast importance that we 
should emphasize and insist upon the reality of 
this division of the whole race into two classes. 
We should never lose sight of this great fact, of 
which the Bible makes so much ; for our earnest- 
ness and our success in carrying forward the Lord's 
work depend largely upon our conviction of its 
truth. But in order that we may realize the fact 
ourselves, or convince others of its reality, we 
must not put the distinction on any false basis, and 
above all we must not refer it to anything that is 
external ; for as we have seen, all external marks 
of difference may fail, and so our sense of the dis- 
tinction be lost, for even Satan himself can appear 
as an angel of light. What, then, is the principle 
of division ? 

According to the uniform and consistent teach- 
ing of Scripture the distinction turns solely upon 
the attitude of the soul toward God, our Creator. 
Those who believe that God is, and that He is the 
rewarder of them that diligently seek Him, and 
who, thus believing, exercise toward Him feelings 
of love and reverence ; recognizing his influence 



THE SURE FOUNDATION, AND ITS SEAL. 77 

in their lives, trusting in His fatherly mercy, and 
striving to obey His commands, — all who occupy 
this attitude are God's friends ; they belong to the 
company of the saved. In Scripture language, 
they are the saints. 

On the other hand, those who refuse or neglect 
to bring the thought of God's authority and love 
into their lives ; those who forget God ; those who 
do not order their lives with reference to the divine 
will ; who do not practically believe in Him, and 
therefore do not diligently seek Him, — all who are 
thus standing with their backs toward God, no 
matter how irreproachable their conduct may be, are 
his enemies — they are unsaved, they are distinct- 
ively sinners. Here, then, in the attitude of the 
soul toward God, we find the crucial test accord- 
ing to which the dividing line is drawn. 

Thus, we read in the Psalms, ' ' The transgres- 
sion of the wicked saith within my heart, that 
there is no fear of God before his eyes." And in 
the Epistle to the Hebrews, the Apostle warns us, 
''Take heed lest there be in any of you an evil 
heart of unbelief, in departing from the living 
God." And in the Epistle to the Ephesians, he 
speaks of those who have no hope, as being ' ' with- 
out God in the world." So, on the other hand, 
we are told that ' ' the Lord is nigh unto all them 
that call upon him, to all that call upon him 
in truth ; " and again, ' ' Behold, the eye of the Lord 



78 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

is upon them that fear him, upon them that hope 
in his mercy." And the Apostle Peter declares, 
"Of a truth, I perceive that God is no respecter 
of persons : but in every nation he that feareth 
him, and worketh righteousness is accepted with 
him." And Paul, quoting the words of the prophet 
Joel, asserts, ' ' Whosoever shall call upon the name 
of the Lord shall be saved. " 

The same thing is evident when we examine 
the Scripture biographies. The elect, the saved, 
are those who "walk with God" like Enoch 
and Noah. Abraham, who believes God and 
lives in the fear of him, is called " the friend of 
God." Jacob, though a man of many faults, and 
having many mean and selfish traits, yet holds fast 
to the God of his Father, and yields to His train- 
ing, and so is known as Israel "a prince with God." 
Moses hearkens to the divine voice, and prefers 
affliction with God's people to all the riches of god- 
less Egypt ; and Moses is called emphatically ' ' the 
man of God. " David, in spite of weakness and sin, 
returns yet again to the Lord after every fall, and 
carries through all the vicissitudes of his eventful 
life a strong confidence in the goodness of God, 
and an honest purpose to serve Him ; and so David 
is styled "the man after God's own heart." 

Thus we have as the distinguishing characteristic 
of the "saints," as that which entitles them to be 
called "saints," the recognition of the one Holy 
and Supreme God, and the loving submission of the 



THE SURE FOUNDATION, AND ITS SEAL. 79 

life to Him. Those who hold this spiritual attitude 
toward the Creator are the godly ; while those who 
leave God out of their thoughts and their plans, 
who live with no consciousness of His presence, and 
with no love for His name, are the ungodly. Now, 
it may frequently happen that the godly man, un- 
der the stress of temptation, or by the power of 
strong evil tendencies in the flesh, will fall into 
grievous sin — like David and Peter. 

Or, it may even be the case, that, by reason of 
inherited disposition, or early training, the godly 
man will exhibit mean and unworthy traits of char- 
acter — like Jacob. And so, too, on the other hand, 
the godless man will often possess and manifest 
many beautiful and lovable qualities, — nay, under 
the influence of purely worldly motives, and with 
no reference whatever to the divine love or the di- 
vine command, he will often develop a highly moral, 
upright, and even generous character. Still further ; 
through some false modesty or mistaken humility, 
the truly godly man may never openly acknowledge 
the faith and love of his soul, while undoubtedly 
many who are really worldly and godless use the 
forms and assume the livery and repeat the phrases 
of faith, so that we cannot judge with any degree 
of certainty who belong to one class and who to 
the other. 

Still the great distinction is there. And the day 
will come when we shall all be made manifest before 
the judgment seat of Christ. Under the all-power- 



80 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

ful, supernatural training to which the godly man 
has submitted himself, all his sin and imperfec- 
tions will be finally cleansed away, and all his right- 
eousness made perfect ; while the godless man, 
stripped of all pretenses, and being no longer un- 
der temporal, but only under eternal influences, to 
which he has always refused submission, will also 
appear in his true character. And then in that 
day of perfect truth when the secret of all hearts 
shall be revealed, the word of the prophet Malachi 
shall be fulfilled, and ' ' we shall return and discern 
between the righteous and the wicked, between 
him that serveth God and him that serveth him not." 

Now if all this be true, and it seems to me that 
it must require immense self-confidence and a most 
blind egotism to deny it, — if this be true, that 
there are just two parties in the world, two classes 
of men ; if it be true that our real, permanent char- 
acter and our eternal destiny depend upon our 
godliness or ungodliness, then certainly the most im- 
portant question that any man can ask himself is, 
' ' Where do I stand ? to which class do I belong ? " 
And we should give our souls no rest until we know 
that we are on God's side. And this brings us to 
the great central truth of Christianity. In Jesus 
Christ God comes down to men, and reveals Him- 
self perfectly as the Friend and Saviour of human 
souls. 

In and through Christ we have access unto the 
Father. He is "the way, the truth, and the life." 



THE SURE FOUNDATION, AND ITS SEAL. 81 

By accepting Him as our guide and example, by be- 
lieving His words, by trusting in His work, by 
adopting the principles of His life and His teach- 
ings, by union with Him in love and faith, we come 
to know God, and to know that we know Him. And 
then through this loving companionship with the 
Son of God, we learn to recognize the divine voice, 
to submit to the divine will, to be guided by the di- 
vine spirit, and so we become essentially godly, and 
have the assurance of salvation and eternal life. 
And there is no other way to get on the Lord's side 
and to bring God into our lives ; there is no other 
name given under Heaven whereby we can be 
saved. " No one," says Christ, " cometh unto the 
Father but by me." 

No doubt where the historical Christ has not 
been made known, men may feel after God and 
find Him ; yet it is through Christ that they are 
saved and enabled to become godly, although they 
know it not. But those who know Christ historic- 
ally, who are familiar with His life and character, 
cannot reject Him without rejecting God ; for God 
is in Christ for the purpose of reconciling the world 
unto Himself, and if you refuse this most full and 
complete revelation of God, how can you hope ever 
to find Him in any other way. 

If you do not recognize the voice of God when 
he speaks by His beloved Son ; if you are not at- 
tracted and won by the love of God, when that 
love is displayed at Bethlehem and on Calvary ; if 
6 



82 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

your heart and conscience do not respond to the 
spirit which breathes forth from all the radiant life 
of the Nazarene ; if, when you look upon Jesus, 
you see in Him no divine beauty that you should 
desire Him ; if, when He stands before you declar- 
ing, ' ' I am the bread of life, " you feel no soul 
hunger, — then I see not how you can ever come 
unto: God, or realize His presence, or fulfill that 
condition of godly living, which is necessary to 
insure you a part in the great salvation. 

O, then, be Christian if you would be godly. 
Range yourself on the side of God and truth, by 
accepting the Son of God as the guide of your 
thoughts, and the Lord of your affections ; and 
under His leadership, and through brotherhood 
with Him, you will be enabled to "walk with 
God," and to know the inexpressible peace and joy 
of His saving presence. 

And now, one step further : if you are a God- 
fearing man, seeking to live daily under the divine 
direction, holding, by faith in Jesus Christ, to the 
friendship and fatherhood of the Creator, then it is 
not only your privilege, but your imperative duty 
to publicly acknowledge this your life principle. It 
is clearly demanded of you that you should add 
your name and your influence to the organized 
body of God's people. 

And the fact which we have emphasized this 
morning, that the church does not contain only 



THE SURE FOUNDATION, AND ITS SEAL. 83 

the godly, nor all the godly, affords no ground of 
excuse for the neglect of this duty. Because tares 
grow with the wheat, shall we let our fields lie 
fallow ? Because bad fish are in the. net as well as 
good ones, shall we destroy our nets ? In spite of 
its defects and imperfections, the church is the 
divinely appointed instrument for the maintenance 
and extention of godliness among men. This is 
its aim, this is the reason of its existence. For 
this purpose its countless buildings are reared, its 
congregations are assembled, its worship is ordered. 
It is for the promotion of godliness that its ministers 
are ordained to preach, and its missionaries are sent 
to the uttermost parts of the earth, and the Bible 
distributed among all nations. 

To the same great end of keeping the hearts of 
men in conscious union with God are its sacred 
rites of baptism and the Lord's supper ; that by out- 
ward sign, by significant symbol, it may express and 
deepen its conviction that there is a difference be- 
tween consecration and worldliness, and that ' ' the 
Lord knoweth them that are his." This is the 
aim of the church ; and though it falls far below 
its ideal, it is the only institution in the world 
appointed by God to represent and increase the 
party of the godly among men. How else, then, 
except by sharing the responsibilities of church 
membership, can you either manifest your purpose 
to lead a godly life, or do your part in upholding 



84 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

the name and carrying forward the purposes of 
your Lord and Saviour ? 

Is there any other organization which can show 
such evidence of divine appointment ? Is there 
any other party or body of men, any fraternity or 
society, by joining which you can range yourselves 
by the side of the apostles and martyrs and the 
godly of all ages, as followers and subjects of Jesus 
Christ ? Is there any other institution through 
which you can work to such advantage for the per- 
suasion of men to the love and fear of God ? 

But, you say, why need I belong to any organiza- 
tion ? why join any society ? If I believe in God 
and try to live righteously before Him, is not that 
enough? — No; it is not fair; it is not honest; 
for why should you desire to shirk the responsibili- 
ties and duties which God has laid upon all who 
would be accounted His friends ? Or why should 
you refuse to show your colors ? There is an influ- 
ence to be exerted, there is a work to be performed 
by the church ; and if you are to be excused from 
this service, why should not I, and why should not 
all the servants of God be excused ? And then 
when we have disbanded the church, and each 
proceeds on his own account to live the godly life, 
and do the godly work, how long do you think such 
a state of things would last ? Is it not evident that 
either godliness would soon become a lost art, or a 
new organization, a new society, a new church 



THE SURE FOUNDATION, AND ITS SEAL. 85 

would be formed from the very necessities of the 
case ? 

But, you say, surely I can be a Christan, I can be 
saved, without being a church member ! That 
may be true ; but it is utterly irrelevant. It has 
nothing to do with the matter in hand. I am not 
urging you to join the church in order that you 
may be saved, but in order that being saved, you 
may perform the duty and fill the position of a 
saved man. That duty is in the church — that 
position is among God's professed friends. 



? * 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST. 



BY REV. J. W. DINSMORE, 

Pastor of the First Church, San Jose, California. 



What shall I do then with Jesus, which is called Christ? 
Matt. 27: 22. 

So cried Pontius Pilate, the pagan, in his anger,- 
vexation, and fear. The question was probably 
jerked out with a bitter, spiteful fling. He was 
sorely perplexed by the conflict between what he 
felt to be his duty, and what he fancied to be his 
policy. He knew well enough what he ought to 
do. It is plain, too, that he wished to release 
Jesus, whom he declared to be faultless, and the 
victim of causeless malice. He at first refused to 
try the case, and sent Jesus to Herod ; but that 
ruffian, having mocked and insulted the meek, but 
august prisoner, sent Him back to Pilate. 

Pilate now tried to silence the furious clamor of 
the rabble, but was overborne by the pressure of 
public feeling, and by the powerful energy of a 
tumultuous assembly, which he was noble enough 
to detest, but not noble enough to crush. He 

[86] 



*#?! ^fea^ 




REV. I.\W. DINSMORE, D. D. 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST. 87 

failed because his resistance was too weak and con- 
ciliatory. It was no time for polite persuasions ; it 
was a time for a commanding voice and a mailed 
hand. Pilate could not plead want of power. He 
was the representative of the greatest power on 
earth. He had in the city, a garrison of imperial 
troops, who at a word from him, would have swept 
the streets of these lawless men, or made those 
streets red with their blood. That word was not 
spoken. On the contrary, he tried by craft and 
diplomacy to divert these blood-hounds from their 
scent, and cheat them of their prey by placing a 
notorious robber — a sort of Sontag or Evans — 
and the holy Christ side by side, and asking the 
crowd to choose between these two. He thought 
by this device to force a favorable verdict, but he 
mistook the temper of that murderous multitude. 
He then made the mob a jury, and appealed to 
them for a verdict as to what he should do with 
"Jesus which is called Christ," and this, as if he 
foolishly thought that the crowd had conscience 
enough to treat Christ fairly ! At any rate, he was 
planning that the decision might be made, the re- 
sponsibility taken by others, and not by him ; be- 
cause he wished most explicitly to disown the crime 
and put the blood of the Innocent on other hands 
than his. Of course, this was a weak and childish 
subterfuge. But let us give Pilate his due. Some- 
thing is to be said in his behalf. He is not to be 



88 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULP J T. 

classed with the brutal Herod, nor with the roaring 
mob, nor with the blood-thirsty chief priests who 
instigated the enormous wickedness. 

If there had been no worse men than Pilate, 
Jesus would not have been crucified. While he 
had a natural conscience, and a Roman sense of 
justice, he was a pagan, and had neither the stand- 
ard nor the feeling of right and wrong which is 
furnished by the Word of God ; nor had he any of 
those high sentiments and noble instincts of right- 
eousness which are wrought into us by the blood 
and traditions of unnumbered generations of 
Christian ancestors. Besides, his situation was 
extremely trying and difficult. The outlying prov- 
inces of the vastly extended empire were under the 
care of procurators, or deputy-governors, who were 
held to strict account directly to the emperor. 
There was a civil service system by which an able 
and successful administration brought the governor 
credit at Rome, and promotion to a more lucrative 
place. By failure, failure especially in the two re- 
spects of keeping down insurrections and collecting 
taxes, he lost his credit, and often his head — not 
merely his official head, but his proper, personal 
head. 

Now Judea was one of the most turbulent and 
troublesome of all the provinces of the empire. 
What Ireland is and long has been to England, 
Judea was to Rome, — the perennial hot-bed of se- 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST. 89 

ditions, conspiracies, and insurrections. Governor 
after governor had tried and failed, and had suffered 
the doom of the unsuccessful. Pontius Pilate was 
bound to succeed. At first he had tried severity, 
and had turned his soldiers upon a parcel of fanat- 
ical Galileans, and slaughtered them in the streets, 
thus mingling their blood with their sacrifices. This 
had failed. Now he was trying the policy of con- 
ciliation and compromise, anything to keep the 
people quiet and get them to pay their taxes, till he 
could get rid of his dangerous place and go up 
higher. Political success was to him the breath of 
life. He hated injustice, but he hated failure still 
more. He was afraid to shed innocent blood, but 
he was far more afraid of his imperial master on 
the banks of the Tiber. The chief priests perceiv- 
ing his timidity, boldly threatened him with the 
vengeance of Caesar if he suffered this Man, who 
claimed to be a king, and so a rival of Caesar, to 
escape. It was plain that the ruling classes among 
the Jews fiercely demanded the blood of this blame- 
less but friendless Man, and having tried in vain to 
argue and coax them out of their purpose, he at last 
gave in to it. 

He thought the blood of Jesus would appease 
the fury of the people ; that the storm would soon 
blow over ; that this awful outrage on a poor and 
friendless Man would soon be forgotten, and all 
things settle down as they were before. So, in 



9 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

that critical moment, he gave up the Lord to the 
malice of His foes, and his own name to endless 
infamy, at what he doubtless fancied to be the 
dictate of worldly prudence and the demand of 
public policy. O Pilate ! Pilate ! I must blame 
thee ; but none the less I sadly pity thee. Thou 
didst not mean to connive at the most hideous 
crime of history, but thou didst it all the same. 
Thou didst miss thy one great opportunity, not to 
win a fleeting credit in Jerusalem or Rome, but to 
win immortal honor in all the world and through 
all the Christian ages ; and now, thou art pilloried 
in the sight of all the Christian centuries, in 
history, literature, art, and execrated by all Chris- 
tian hearts, because in this supreme hour thou 
didst prove craven and coward ; didst deny the 
Holy One and Just, and through thy weakness 
gave Him up to death ! 

This I judge to be the true explanation of 
Pilate's conduct, and I have dwelt upon it, because 
it is so dwelt upon in the Gospels. All this has 
not merely a historic interest, but a living one to 
us here and now. That scene, so far away as to 
time and place, has its millionfold repetition among 
ourselves here and now. Pilate's question is not 
one that can be asked and answered once for all. 
Every one of us has to meet that very issue, and 
answer for himself, — "What shall I do with Jesus 
which is called Christ ? " And the question goes to 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST 91 

the very root of all we have to fear on the one 
hand, and to hope for on the other, in this world 
and the world to come. Pilate's question received 
several answers at that time, and they were typical 
of like answers the same question receives now. 

i. There teas the answer of Christ s open and 
aggressive foes. This found expression in the fierce 
demand of the chief priests and the mob, that He 
be crucified. They would listen to nothing. They 
knew what they wanted ; their hate was definite 
and concentrated ; inflamed by malice, they surged 
and shouted round the judgment seat of Pilate, si- 
lencing his expostulations by simply yelling, ' ' Away 
with Him ! Away with Him ! Crucify Him ! Cru- 
cify Him ! " And it is but sober truth to say that 
this has been the temper of aggressive hatred of 
our Lord from that day to this. The ruffian yell 
of the mob has found its echo in the pagan scorn 
of Celsus and Porphyry and Julian ; in the refined 
raillery of Voltaire ; in the coarse vulgarity of 
Paine ; in the shallow and shocking blasphemies of 
our American stump orator of atheism ; and scarcely 
less bitterly, in the more polite vituperation of more 
gentlemanly infidels. 

We marvel that the harmless and holy Christ, who 
never did anything but good, should have provoked 
such deadly hostility against Himself even in that 
far-away and semi-barbarous age. But is it not a 
greater marvel that in this last part of the nineteenth 



92 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Christian century, and among ourselves in the benefi- 
cent shadow of Christian institutions ; in the lumi- 
nous focus of Christian civilization, so many should 
be found who share this old hostility — who fairly 
hate Jesus Christ ? Can this be accounted for except 
as Christ and the Scriptures explain it, — by refer- 
ring it to the perverseness and depravity of our 
fallen nature due to sin ? And this very hatred, so 
deadly and so causeless, is a striking proof of His 
truth and claims because expressly foretold. If it 
had not been encountered, that would have tended 
to prove Him a false witness. Hence the gratuitous 
hostility of His foes helps to vindicate His truth 
and establish His claims. 

2. The second may be called the evasive answer, 
and was voiced by Pilate's wife, when she sent to 
her husband a hasty and earnest message, ' ' Have 
thou nothing to do with that just man, for I have 
suffered many things this day in a dream because 
of him." She had a woman's insight into the 
difficulty and danger of her husband's position, and 
she was so concerned about it that it troubled her 
dreams. Her fears may have resulted from her 
superstition, or from a veritable communication 
from God. Why not ? The Greek Church has 
canonized this woman, and put her in the catalogue 
of saints, because of her effort to save the Lord by 
saving her husband. Anyhow, she clearly saw the 
peril of her husband's position, peril on the one 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST 93 

hand to his integrity as a magistrate, and his honor 
as a man and a Roman if he should condemn the 
innocent ; and on the other, the peril to his office 
and his life, if he should undertake to rescue Him 
from popular fury. So she anxiously counseled 
him to extricate himself from the difficulty by refus- 
ing to have anything to do with this just Man. 
But that was the one thing precisely which Pilate 
could not do. He tried his best, in more ways 
than one, to follow this advice. At first he refused 
to take jurisdiction, saying to the Jews, ' ' This is a 
question of your own law ; let Him be sent to 
Herod, your own Jewish magistrate. " Herod would 
not take jurisdiction either, and having brutally 
insulted Him, sent Him back to Pilate, who having 
tried by persuasions, expostulations, and appeals to 
effect His deliverance, at last gave up, loudly dis- 
owning all responsibility, and publicly washing his 
hands as a silly token, on the childish pretext that 
he could thus wash his soul of the whole black in- 
famy and crime. 

So is it ever, my friends. Jesus Christ humbles 
Himself to stand before the bar of every one of us 
for judgment. We may try in many ways to evade 
the issue, but in vain. We may refuse jurisdiction, 
but He will return and confront us again. W T e 
must give in our verdict, make our decision. No 
evasions or subterfuges will avail. We may boldly 
confess and espouse Him, or deny and condemn 



94 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Him ; but one thing we cannot do, and that is do 
nothing — dismiss the case without a judgment. 
Nor can we on any plea or pretext wash our hands 
or our souls of the responsibility of our verdict. 
That decree will stand ; it is entered on the records 
of a Higher Court, and one day we shall meet it. 
What shall I do with Jesus which is called Christ ? 
is a question which at this moment forces itself 
upon every one of us who has not already settled 
it finally and forever. It cannot be evaded or 
avoided ; it must be squarely faced. What is your 
answer ? That answer will be given before you 
leave this house, and angels will carry it for record 
in the Higher Court. 

3. The third answer may be called the compro- 
mising answer. It found expression in the language 
of Pilate himself, — "I will chastise him, and let 
him go." Pilate confessed that there was no fault 
in Him ; that the arraignment was wholly of mal- 
ice ; yet he proposed to chastise Him. This was a 
light whipping, inflicted for petty offenses, with 
small cords ; a very different thing from the scourg- 
ing, a punishment of the most dreadful description, 
with the terrific flagellum, the most horrible scourge 
ever invented. This last was so terrible that strong 
men often swooned, and not infrequently died 
under it. But the chastising was more for deg- 
radation than for suffering. Pilate proposed this, 
not because it was deserved, but in the hope that 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST. 95 

by this degradation, the malice of the mob might 
be appeased. In proposing a smaller injustice, he 
hoped to escape a greater. But the hope was a 
foolish delusion. His proposal was instantly and 
loudly rejected, and the bloody demand renewed 
and re-enforced. The Lord's enemies were not to 
be cheated of their prey by any compromise, nor 
turned from their fell purpose by any partial con- 
cession. Indeed, Pilate's proposal served only to 
strengthen the resolution and inflame the fury of 
the rabble. It showed that the governor was 
wavering, and it required but the downright energy 
of the mob to overbear the vacillating Pilate, and 
compel him to give up the Holy One, not to chas- 
tisement, but to the terrific scourge and the awful 
cross. 

Pilate's whole policy miserably failed. Instead 
of the favor, he got the contempt of the people. 
Soon he was recalled to Rome in disgrace, and to 
avert a dreaded doom, perished by his own hand ; 
or according to another story, was executed by Ca- 
ligula, the emperor. He sold his soul to keep his 
place. It is certain that he lost his place, and it is 
to be feared that he lost his soul. So is it ever, 
my friends. The position of Pilate is forever un- 
tenable ; his proposal forever unavailing. When 
the question comes up, "What shall I do with 
Jesus which is called Christ ? " concessions, compro- 
mises, and half-way measures, are forever hateful and 



; : 



:.:; ;: h; .-.: ; :;; :j :he h/.y J ; , : ;.-.-/. — ;;;--;: 

.ss: :r.c" — ; :s ; ; 
Lard The K seen in the 

church, and even in the pulpit, in a : 

or the claims of the . 
doctrines . ts stringent obi ig s- 

honor the div: ^on and M 

Christ, in the hope that what is left 

ciliated, that the world will be brought into bv 
humor with Christ and Chris :han no s 

is a shallow dekisi::: — -nd stupid s 

Pilate showed himself to be :e him- 

self contemptible in the s ol all honest and earn- 

I ickl ig 

That pulpit must ahvi on 

the moral convictions of t. that eh 

can never be ago ad commanding which 

goes in the Pi. i and i s .: the F 

policy. The pulpits that a most powerful. 

from Chrysostom to Charles Spurgeon and John Hall, 
are y « that exalt the Lord Jesi 

highly; th.v :th and maintain His 

clai: the most unfaltering accent and the 

most uncomprc: sing c rag And, I s in- 

dividuals g een the 

low level of 5, and the high level of 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST. 97 

His disciples and defenders. So He classifies us, 
and will in the Great Day. " He that is not with 
me, is against me;" and, " Whosoever shall deny 
me," etc. The time comes, my friends, and comes 
soon, when all evasions and subterfuges break 
down, and we must stand face to face with the 
actual and eternal fact. Pilate long since saw his 
awful blunder and sin, but when it was too late to 
mend it. Pilate had his hour and opportunity to 
get an immortality not only of worldly honor but 
also of heavenly glory. He lost it ; not because he 
hated the Lord, but because he had not the cour- 
age and decision openly to confess Him. And his 
failure was fatal. And this surely is a lesson to us 
all, and one we need deeply to ponder. 

Fi?tally : The Christian answer to Pilate ' s ques- 
tion. This finds voice in such expressions as these : 
' ' My Lord and my God ; " ' ' Let us also go, that 
we may die with him ; " ' ' Let us go forth . . . 
bearing his reproach ; " ' ' God forbid that I should 
glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." 
As there was no doubt as to what the mob wished 
to do with Jesus which is called Christ, so there 
was no doubt what His disciples wished to do with 
Him. Only Pilate was in doubt, the shrewd, cal- 
culating man of the world, who tried to serve him- 
self and this world without sacrificing the Lord, — 
it was he who was at a loss as to what he should do 



98 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

with Jesus which is called Christ. By position and 
authority he was the strongest man there, and yet 
he was the weakest. 

Just so is it to-day and among ourselves. The 
out-and-out enemies of our Lord know what they 
want to do with Him. ' ' Away with Him, away 
with Him ! crucify Him ! " Dishonor Him in the 
estimation of the people, and destroy His truth and 
kingdom from the earth ! No less, His out-and-out 
friends know what they want to do with Him. 
They want to honor and exalt Him as the ever- 
blessed Saviour and Sovereign of the world, and by 
all means to extend and strengthen His truth and 
kingdom in the earth. His enemies have a definite 
purpose, an unresting malice, and a resolute and 
determined energy of hatred and opposition. 

Millions of His loyal and loving friends, v/ho 
know the power of His saving grace in their own 
lives, have an equally definite, and far nobler pur- 
pose ; a benevolent zeal no less unresting than the 
malice of His foes ; an energy, earnestness, and an 
enthusiasm more self-sacrificing and heroic than 
any other cause or person known to history has 
ever inspired, all directed to the extension of His 
kingdom and the glory of His name. Only the 
half-hearted, the worldly, the carnal, — those who 
want to manage so as to get this world's prizes and 
pleasures, and yet not deny the Lord and lose their 
souls, — only such are debating with themselves the 



WHAT TO DO WITH CHRIST. 99 

question, ' ' What shall I do with Jesus which is 
called Christ ? " Is n't it high time you decided that 
question ? It will not wait ; it will be decided for you. 
Pilate shirked and shuffled, but the issue was forced 
upon him, and he practically decided what to do 
with Jesus. If, indeed, you are resolved to risk life 
and death, to front eternal destiny without Him, 
and among His enemies, then nothing more is to be 
said. On that decision you must stand or fall. 
God pity you when you move over the verge of the 
world, as you surely shall a little farther on, and 
have no place to set your foot, and are embraced 
in an eternity where you have no home and no 
friend ! 

But I do not believe you have made any such 
resolution. And if you expect in the great Day of 
God to be owned by Him, how can you justify your 
present denial of His Blessed Name ? Do you ex- 
pect more light or knowledge ? Whence is it to 
come ? Do you look for more persuasion ? Why ? 
— and from what quarter ? At this moment, Christ 
stands before you for verdict, just as truly as He 
stood before Pilate. The question is up and must 
have an answer. The issue and the hour are criti- 
cal and solemn. Pilate met and passed his doom 
in that place and that hour. He thought it was 
the hour of judgment for Jesus ; in a far deeper 
sense it was the hour of judgment for Pilate. Let 
us remember that what we do in time, determines 



100 PA CIFJC CO A S T PULPIT. 

destiny. For the decisions and the doom of the 
Judgment Day are simply the disclosure of the 
deeds and decisions of time. What we do here and 
now, in these pews and in such moments as these, 
will be revealed and realized then and there. 

The destinies of eternity are the outcome of the 
decisions of time. We shall be tried by the record. 
The books shall be opened, and the quick and the 
dead shall be judged by the things written in the 
books. It is not by what we may do then and 
there, but by what we do here and now, that eter- 
nal destiny is determined. The question now is, 
"What shall I do with Jesus which is called 
Christ ? " In due time, and ere long, all this will 
be reversed, and the question will be, What shall 
Jesus, reigning Lord and eternal Judge, do with 
me ? Once Jesus stood at Pilate's bar to be judged. 
Long since, Pilate stood at Jesus' bar, to receive for 
the things done in his body, whether good or bad. 
So it is, and so it shall be with every one of us all. 
Let us lay it to heart. "What shall I do with 
Jesus which is called Christ ? " That is the ques- 
tion now. What shall He do with us ? That will 
be the question of Christ in the Day of Judgment. 






I 




REV. THOMAS CHALMERS EASTON. D. D. 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT, OR 
-HEALING THE SPRINGS." 



BY REV. THOMAS C. EASTON, D. D. , 
Late Pastor of Calvary Church, San Francisco, California. 



And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and 
cast the salt in there. 2 Kings 2 : 21. 

Elisha, returning from the triumphal ascension 
of Elijah, conspicuous and illustrious as the transla- 
tion must have been, as the chariots and horses of 
fire, driven by angelic couriers, bore the prophet to 
his rest, clothed with a double portion of Elijah's 
spirit, is prepared to serve his God. Entering the 
city of Jericho, the representative men present to 
him their grievance, — that while they have a pleas- 
ant situation, their water is unwholesome and their 
soil barren. Elisha requests them to bring him a 
new cruise and some salt, and going to the fount- 
ain-head, he casts the salt into the spring, and so 
sweetens the waters and makes fruitful their lands. 
This miracle of the prophet illustrates a great truth, 
that to purify and regenerate the world we must 
cast the healing and curative salt, not into the 

[101] 



102 PA CI/- 7C CO A S T PUL Pi T. 

streams, but the fountain-heads of life ; and this 
furnishes me with a theme for our mutual con- 
sideration. 

RELIGION IN THE SPRING-HEADS OF LIFE. 

Religion ! What do you mean by religion ? I 
mean a recognition of the personal God in relation 
with my personal self. Mr. Joseph Cook, in one 
of< his Tremont Temple lectures, referring specially 
to the changed attitude of the Emersonian trans- 
cendentalists and general utterances of the Concord 
School of Philosophy, says : ' ' There has come upon 
eastern Massachusetts such a change that to-day, 
if I am to be serious in my solitude, if I am not to 
take the side of superficiality and coarseness, if I 
am to be abreast of the loftiest thought in the 
tumult of our speculative age, I must believe in 
two things : that I shall go thence as a personality, 
and that on the other side of the grave I shall meet 
God as a personality. " 

That utterance of the Temple lecturer lays the 
substratum of all religious faith. I a personality, 
God a personality, and these two personalities go- 
ing to meet and recognize each other and hold 
close relations and have great concerns to settle 
beyond the grave, — that is the vital essence of 
religion. But as a Christian, I must introduce 
another factor into this problem of natural theism, 
and that factor is Christ. The personality of God 
is to me inseparable from the personal Christ. 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT. 103 

When, therefore, I speak of religion in the 
spring-heads of life, I mean the Christian religion 
distinctively. And yef not as we find it crystallized 
into the dogmas of any church or ecclesiastical 
organism, but the all-penetrating, all-preserving, 
all-sweetening truth of the Gospel, held in solution 
in all the manifold activities of life, as the salt per- 
vades and sweetens the sea, as the light pervades 
and glorifies the air. 

With this view of religion you cannot separate 
the sacred and the secular. Religion comes to our 
weekday and worldly work, and all our business 
life, and says, ' ' Be ye holy, for holiness is suc- 
cess ; " to our intellectual and social activities, and 
says, " Be ye holy, for holiness is progress ; " whis- 
pers to all the ears of our affections and sensibilites, 
"Be ye holy, for holiness is happiness ;" puts its 
strong arm around all our weaknesses and says, 
"Be ye holy, for holiness is moral omnipotence !" 
Note, then, — 

First, Religion in the Spring-head of Private 
Life. — By this I mean temperance, true self-con- 
trol in all our personal activities, truthfulness in 
word and act, fidelity to trusts committed, integrity, 
that wholeness of character which the very word 
implies. Is there a growing disregard of these car- 
dinal virtues of private life in our times ? Is this 
fountain-head of the moral character bitter ? Is it 
growing more and more unwholesome ? If it be so, 
where is the new cruise that shall sweeten it ? I 



104 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

know of none but the salt of a personal and opera- 
tive faith in God, as holding immediate relations 
with every individual life. A high and worthy 
moral character cannot be built on self-interest, or 
the love of approbation, or personal ambition, or 
the simple influence of benevolence, or the fear 
of personal loss. God alone is the foundation of all 
the truly great in human life ; only God in Christ 
recognized, appropriated by a living faith, can give 
such spiritual quality to our personal manhood as 
to make it pure within, with the prime characteris- 
tics of personal integrity, uprightness, and grandeur. 
Teach the young, teach communities, teach public 
opinion that the individual man is accountable to a 
personal God for private habits, private indulgences, 
all private living and acting, and you will have 
fewer secret intrigues, fewer wild-cat speculations, 
fewer robberies, fewer moral bankrupts in all the 
varying phases of private life. Cast the salt in 
there ! What is true of private life is pre-eminently 
true of all the sacred and clasping relationships of 
home. If this fountain-head be poisoned, who shall 
be able to regenerate the streams ? We need relig- 
ion in our homes because of the closeness of the 
bonds binding us together there. In the easy vio- 
lations of duty, in the daily forgetfulness of the 
holiest promises made at the marriage altar, in the 
dissimilarity of tastes, dispositions, tempers, aims, 
where each real self must adjust itself to each real 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT. 105 

self, or else foster an incompatibility that will ruin 
happiness, there is no spot on earth that needs the 
quickening of religion like home. Home piety is 
the nation's bulwark of strength ! Its literature, its 
spirit, its government must be sweetened by the 
salt of a vital Christian faith. Christ in calmness, 
in tenderness, in self-sacrifice, dwelling in the heart 
of each, will make that home Christian. The 
nearest symbol of the heaven for which we yearn 
should be the earthly home. Cast the salt in 
there ! 

Second, Religion in the Spring-head of Social 
Life. — Society is to-day seething with crude, perni- 
cious, disorganizing theories, from the Ural Mount- 
ains to the Golden Gate. Nihilism in Russia, 
Communism in Germany and France, the so-called 
International League, whose seat is on the Thames, 
but whose arms reach out into Ireland, Italy, Spain, 
America, — these, and a horde of kindred atheistic 
and anarchical agencies, are secretly working at the 
head sources of our social life and order, and un- 
dermining the foundations of our Christian civiliza- 
tion. Where is the antidote to this social poison ? 
The poison is essentially atheistic. "Down with 
governments, down with legal enactments, down 
with the rights of property, down with the family as 
growing out of the marriage relation, down with the 
church, down with the Bible, down with God ! " 
As the poison is atheistic so the antidote must be 



106 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

theistic. Up with God ! In the matter of social 
pleasures, up with God ; in the matter of domestic 
life, up with God ; in business relations, up with 
God ; in the regulation of the industrial relations of 
capital and labor, up with God ; in the acquisition 
and use of wealth, up with God ; in every relation 
of man with man, enthrone Jehovah and ' ' Crown 
Him Lord of all ! " 

Put the Christian law of love into every social 
spring-head, and, like the cruise of Elisha, it shall 
sweeten all the bitter waters of human strife and 
millennialize the world ! 

Third, Religion in the Spring-head of Civil 
Life. — There is a popular clamor in our country 
against any recognition of God or Christ or religion 
by the State. We cry no favoritism to any religion 
in a free and democratic government. Have you 
considered well to what this would tend if carried 
out ? Reconstruct your calendar ; for the very date 
of every legal enactment in the past, including that 
of our national birthday, is a tacit recognition of 
Christianity ; abolish every oath in your courts of 
justice, for these only bind as they take hold on 
God ; banish every chaplain from court and legisla- 
tive hall ; expunge from your statute books all allu- 
sion to a Sabbath ; hammer off your national coinage 
the simple and beautiful legend, ' ' In God we trust ; " 
work every State and federal officer seven days in 
the week, nay, abolish your week altogether, for it 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT. 107 

is not astronomical but divine in its origin ; eviscer- 
ate your whole complex jurisprudence of all the dis- 
tinctive elements of a Christian civilization, and cut 
the nation adrift from all the religious associations 
of the past, yea, isolate it from all sympathetic re- 
lations with Christendom, and make it stand out, 
what ? — A Godless, Christless, Bibleless, prayer- 
less, religionless iceberg, without a green thing to in- 
timate spiritual life or suggest a hope of immortality ! 
Does this sound like sarcasm, unnecessary and un- 
meaningless satire ? I devoutly wish it were so. 
But that wish cannot be gratified, for the air is 
thick with practical infidelity concerning the divine 
jurisdiction over the acts of men in a public and 
representative capacity. When the old sergeant- 
at-arms in Washington, denied admittance into 
the ministers' gallery in the Senate to the clergy- 
man who sought an entrance, there was too much 
truth in the reason he assigned. " Sir," he said, 
1 ' that is the ministers' gallery. " ' ' And I am a 
minister." "Of what court, pray?" "Of the 
court of Heaven." "The United States govern- 
ment holds no relations with that court." 

Are you ready for that ? I think not. The fact 
is, in all civil considerations we are a Christian na- 
tion. It has a right to be such in virtue of the 
great unwritten constitution of discovery, of settle- 
ment, of foundation, of venerable precedent, of 
general acquiescence, of even popular demand, No 



108 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

improvement can come by extracting whatever salt 
of religion may be held in almost invisible solution, 
but by casting in more. We need more of God, more 
of Christ, more of the spirit of His Gospel, more of 
the saving influence of an operative Christianity in 
all the departments of our governmental life. Cast 
the salt in there ! Notice then, — 

Fourth and last, Religion in the Spring-head 
of our Educational Life. — There are three theo- 
ries in regard to the relations of education and re- 
ligion, and each of these has strong advocates and 
supporters in our time : — 

1. That they have "nothing to do with each 
other," and that, practically, they should be di- 
vorced. This theory regards popular education in 
all its stages, from infancy to manhood, from the 
primary department of the public school to the 
graduating class of the university, as a purely 
secular concern. This theory has some support 
among religious men, but chiefly it is the theory of 
all unbelievers, skeptics, and atheists. It is gross 
secularism ! 

2. At the other extreme is the theory that all 
education belongs to the church ; that intellectual 
culture is only one element in character building, 
while moral and religious culture is a co-element of 
paramount importance, and the two should never 
be separated. It is claimed that the church, and 
not the State, is the foster-mother of all growth of 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT. 109 

character. Hence, parochial schools and colleges 
rise in antagonism to our public schools, and the 
papal church, with its hostile spirit to our Protest- 
ant Bible, builds these institutions. It is extreme 
churchism ! 

3. Between these two extremes we find a golden 
mean. In reply to the secularist we say education 
cannot be secularized. We have a moral nature. 
The child has certain ethical appetites. These will 
be fed. You cannot educate on the basis of a pure 
secularism, because of this moral nature, which, in 
the process of intellectual culture, must find some 
development, either upward or downward. On 
the -other hand, we do not accept the logic of 
the Romanist, demanding a distinctively dogmatic 
Christian element in popular education. We would 
not insist on catechism or Biblical instruction in the 
common school. We find a broad and generous 
platform, resting on strong and lasting substruc- 
tions, on which all the friends of popular education 
can stand ; and this is not church education, but 
Christian education. I do not believe that to be con- 
sistent with our theory of government public schools 
must be Godless, Christless, Bibleless, prayerless. 
I am persuaded that as our government, though 
not declaratively in the letter, is yet implied 
in the spirit, Christian, so the religion of Christ 
should be a kind of unwritten law in the school- 
room, controlling the words, the acts, the conduct 



110 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

of teacher and scholar ; informally but strongly 
inculcating the divine principles of love to God and 
love to man, illustrating the sublime moralities of 
the Sermon on the Mount, and distilling, as the 
dew on the flowers, the sweet influences of an un- 
announced and undogmatic Gospel into the blos- 
soming minds and hearts of childhood. Cast the 
salt in there ! 

There is no other position to take as to the 
higher education. It is to be feared that in many 
of our State universities there is little if any relig- 
ious influence. Sometimes there is a decidedly un- 
religious drift ; so much so as not only not to 
establish but absolutely unsettle whatever religious 
faith the student previously enjoyed, and send him 
adrift an agnostic, with doubts darkening life here 
and hereafter. Now, what are the facts ? You 
cannot study man and his works well apart from 
God. Every truth in human philosophy is the 
echo of God in the soul, and pure mathematics is 
God's truth, an outcome of His own eternal 
thought. You can no more teach history well 
without noting the finger-marks of God on the 
scroll, than you can teach mechanics without the 
recognition of force ; or astronomy, and leave out 
reference to the principles of gravitation. What 
would you say of the scientist who should discourse 
learnedly of chemical action but ignore all matter 
of affinities ; or of meteorology, making no mention 



V/HERE TO THROW YOUR SALT. Ill 

of that subtile and all-pervading agent, electricity ; 
or the musician who should thrum the keyboard, 
but never allude to the mysterious but beautiful 
laws of sound ? But such a one would no more 
signally fail of the truly scientific idea than does he 
who tries to read nature without apprehending God, 
or to explain the mysteries of human life without 
taking cognizance' of the religious forces that have 
so much to do with that life. 

Hence, in these times, there can be no full, 
rounded education that is not, at least in its ul- 
timate reduction, a Christian education. You 
cannot — it is impossible — eliminate Christ and 
revealed religion from the equation of truth and still 
preserve the equation ! So we conclude that to 
conserve the interests of both education and relig- 
ion, they must be mutually inter-penetrating and 
inter-acting ; education, in its culture of the whole 
man, giving something like a harmonious and con- 
sistent form and method to all the religious instincts 
and outgrowths, while the warm and vitalizing 
atmosphere of the cross of Calvary shall make the 
cold, glittering body of merely secular education 
alive with the power of God. Cast the salt in 
there ! 

If, then, our nation survives the fate that has 
overtaken the proudest monarchies, it must be be- 
cause these healthy vitalities of our interior life 
flourish. God in the home ; God in civil life ; 



112 PA CI FIG CO. 1ST PL 'L PI T. 



God in education ; and to secure this, the one and 
only thing remaining is the universal spread of the 
Bible ! That is the salt that must be cast into all 
the spring-heads of our life, private, social, civil, 
and religious ! 

This wondrous Book is adapted and designed to 
meet all phases and conditions of human society in 
all its relations and under all circumstances. Look 
at what it has done. All time, all history, are com- 
mentaries on its meaning, and evidences of its 
power. Moving through the ages, ' ( like the march 
of the planets," its language, the language of honor 
and conquest! its accents, how manly and noble ! its 
words, how human yet how divine ! its influence, 
how renovating and all-inspiring ! It has moulded 
anew the life of the nations and the politics of the 
world ; has impregnated the whole soil of society 
with its principles, and the world's atmosphere with 
its influences, in spite of all the perversion and op- 
position of men. All the humane and philan- 
thropic movements, and social ameliorations of mod- 
ern times, what are they ? — Only the ideas of the 
Word of God carried out — so many acted and ex- 
emplified gospels. And what does all this prove 
but the wonderful adaptability of the Bible to be 
the motive power of the world ? 

Being thus the best informing energy of the 
world, the true soul of its best life, it cannot stop 
short of ' ' universal empire ! " With its exceeding 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT 113 

broad commandments, so broad that they touch life 
at all points, the minister of Jesus Christ in ex- 
pounding and enforcing the claims of this Word, is 
not to consent to any abridgment of its authority 
or circumscription of its domain. Having unfurled 
its standard over the citadel, — the spiritual nature 
of man, — he is not to stop there, but is to lengthen 
his radius until he sweeps around the whole circum- 
ference of human life, until on the bridles of our 
horses and beams of our machinery, on our mer- 
chandise and on our hire, there shall be inscribed, 
" Holiness to the Lord ! " 

What a prowling, inquisitive, meddlesome book 
this Bible is ! It insists upon going with man 
everywhere, to supervise all his doings and regulate 
all his affairs. Into the halls of state, into the cabi- 
nets of kings and rulers, into every office, counting- 
room, store, mill, and shop it enters, proclaiming 
its truths, revealing its governing principles, and 
calling men to virtue and righteousness. Theodore 
Parker said of it : — 

"This collection of books has taken such a hold on the 
world as no other. It is read of a Sabbath in all of the ten 
thousand pulpits of our land. The sun never sets on its 
gleaming pages. It goes equally to the cottage of the plain 
man and the palace of the king. It is woven into the litera- 
ture of the scholar, and colors the talk of the street. The 
bark of the merchant cannot sail the sea without it. No 
ships of war go to the conflict but the Bible is there. It en- 
ters men's closets, mingles in all the grief and cheerfulness 



114 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

of life. The affianced maiden prays God in Scripture for 
strength in her new duties. Men are married by Scripture. 
The Bible attends them in their sickness ; when the fever 
of this world is on them, the aching head finds a softer 
pillow when the Bible is underneath. The mariner escap- 
ing from shipwreck clutches this first of his treasures, and 
keeps it sacred to his God. It goes with the peddler in 
his crowded pack, cheers him at eventide when he sits down 
dusty and fatigued ; and brightens the freshness of his 
morning face. It blesses us when we are born, gives names 
to half of Christendom, rejoices with us, has sympathy with 
our mournings, tempers our grief to finer issues. It is the 
better part of our sermons, it lifts man above himself. Our 
best of uttered prayers are in its storied speech, wherewith 
our fathers and patriarchs prayed. The timid man about 
awaking from the dream of life looks through the glass of 
Scripture, and his eye grows bright. He does not fear to 
stand alone ; to tread the way unknown and distant, to 
take the death angel by the hand, and bid farewell to wife 
and babes and home. Men rest on this their dearest hopes ; 
it tells them of God and His blessed Son, of earthly duties 
and of heavenly rest." 

Such is a summary of the relations which it so 
completely fills. Who can ever doubt but it is the 
salt to sweeten all the streams of life — redeem the 
nation and save the world ? 

Men become holy, and nations become great, 
only according to the extent to which they bow in 
reverent submission and obedience to the guidance 
of this Book. Upon the great seal of that metrop- 
olis of Scotland, on the Clyde, famous for its vast 
ship building and world-wide commerce, there 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT. 115 

stands the motto : ' ' Let Glasgow flourish by the 
Word of God." It does flourish, and will flourish, 
and so will all cities that mould their life, institu- 
tions, reforms, and enterprises by firm allegiance 
to God's Word ! Nations do not perish by any 
evolution of fate. The sentence is stamped with 
characters of fire upon the history of the world, 
' ' The nation and kingdom that will not serve Thee 
shall perish." Would that all over our land we 
could- witness a national revival of our loyalty to 
God and His Word ! When Napoleon was asked 
in regard to his Egyptian expedition whether he 
would take Jerusalem on his way, he answered 
bluntly, with a significant sneer, ' ' Jerusalem does 
not come within the line of my operations." But 
he came within the line of Jerusalem's operations, 
and perished !. 

On an estate in the south of England there is a 
circular temple containing in niches the statues of 
some of England's great men. Above these statues 
there is this inscription : ' ' Thine own friend, thy 
father's friend, and thy country's friend forsake not. " 
While we thank God for great men and noble men 
in .the past and the present, and would cherish 
more and more gratefully a memory of their services 
as their country's immortal benefactors, heroes, 
prophets, sages, poets, philosophers, and divines, 
yet we come back still to this Book wet with the 
ruddy drops of Jesus' blood, wet with the tears of 



116 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

penitents, and bathed with the smiles of those 
whom it has consoled in death ; and by all the 
memories of the past, the responsibilities of the 
present, and hopes of the future, we stand by 
the pillars of God's temple ; and above all and 
everything else pledge the new love of heart and 
soul to take the words of ' ' this truest Friend man 
ever knew" as our noblest heritage and choicest 
treasure forever. 

Let us, dear friends, renew this morning our 
vows of love for, and loyalty to, the Bible. We 
love it not only as the old family Bible that lay on 
the stand in the home of our childhood ; not only 
because fingers that are now sweeping the harps of 
gold once turned its leaves by our side ; and eyes 
that are now riveted in ecstatic rapture on the 
Lamb in the midst of the throne, once read eagerly 
its divine promises ; and voices that now swell 
Heaven's anthem, once joined with ours in David's 
psalms and Calvary's hymns ; we love the Bible 
not only for its priceless legacy to our own souls ; 
for its wells of salvation, out of which we have 
drawn the refreshment of the living waters ; for its 
crimsoned Cross where our burden of sin rolled off 
forever ; for its empty sepulcher where we have 
risen to newness of life ; for its Jesus, Saviour, 
Elder Brother, abiding Friend ; for its never-failing 
promises in Christ ; for its assurance of death con- 
quered and of mansions prepared, — but we love 



WHERE TO THROW YOUR SALT. 11? 

the Bible because it is ' ' the wisdom of God and 
the power of God " unto the world's salvation ; God's 
hammer to break flinty hearts to pieces ; God's 
truth to illumine darkened nations ; God's peace to 
calm troubled souls ; God's manna to nourish and 
sustain pilgrims up to the Jordan of the promised 
land ! And I tell you, we shall love it more when 
we open its pages at Jesus' feet, and the glory from 
His face brings out new harmonies, new celestial 
tints and unlooked-for glories. Its wondrous truths, 
prepared in the eternal councils of God before the 
foundation of the world, and enclosed as gems in 
this Book, will burst forth in richer beauty under 
the new heavens and in that new earth wherein 
dwelleth righteousness. 

11 Aye, fixed for everlasting years, 

Unmoved amid the wreck of spheres, 
The Word shall shine in cloudless day, 
When heaven and earth are passed away." 

Let us, then, cast the salt of this golden cruise 
into all the springs, nor stay the circulation of the 
blessed Word of God until these streams of our 
national life — the life of the globe — roll in purity 
even as pure as the crystal waters flowing from the 
throne of God and the Lamb, in the ripple of 
whose waves shall be heard the music of its des- 
tiny : ' ' The Word of the Lord endureth for- 
ever. " Amen. 



GOD INSCRUTABLE: WHY? 



BY REV. W. W. FARIS, D. D. 
Editor San Francisco Occident. 



Why standest thou afar off, Lord ? why hidest thou 
thyself in tunes of trouble ? Ps. 10:1. 

In these words the Psalmist voices the common 
feeling — that when we want God, He seems far off. 

Often when, in our careless life, we do not want 
Him, His hand is felt, and it is heavy. Some provi- 
dence lays an arrest upon our steps and balks our 
cherished plans. An unseasonable summer destroys 
our ungathered crop ; or a fire, a storm, a flood, 
interferes ; we feel the grip of God's hand on the 
throat of our prosperity. But when, in our trouble, 
we cry to Him for succor, He seems to recede. The 
heavens give back nor sign nor sound. Trouble and 
terror awaken us to some desire for God, when 
suddenly we find ourselves orphaned, stranded on 
the shores of empty space, or seized in the clutch 
of a soulless Fate. Why is this ? ' ' Why standest 
thou afar off, O Lord ? why hidest thou thyself in 
times of trouble ? " 

[118] 




REV. W. W. FAEIS, D. D. 



GOD INSCRUTABLE: WHY? 119 

But this is not all. What squalor, what want and 
woe, lie all about us ! Children begging, women 
oppressed, godlessness and crime rampant, men 
driven to despair ! and still God's sun rises and sets, 
and his stars shine in the far-off sky, — the day se- 
rene and the night calm, the order of the universe 
undisturbed, — though hearts are breaking, and the 
precious freightage of human life goes to wreck by 
wholesale, till one would think the wails of myraid 
victims would pierce the skies. Where is God ? 
Why is He so far off ? Why is there no answer to 
man's cry ? Faith reels, reason staggers, breath 
fails, — and yet the heavens are not rent to reveal 
God's hand stretched forth to our relief. Why ? 
Does He not care ? Is there, after all, no God ? 
' ' Why standest thou afar off, O Lord ? why hidest 
thou thyself in times of trouble ? " 

This language of Scripture expresses the univer- 
sal conviction and the patent fact. God hides Him- 
self. We feel after Him, but we touch Him not. 
Clouds and darkness are round about Him. We 
cry to Him, but no answering voice returns. The 
signs of His presence seem dim and distant. " Ver- 
ily thou art a God that hidest thyself. " The only 
written revelation of Him is so marred by the touch 
of human fingers that scoffers find room for deny- 
ing that it is a revelation. Only once, in one little 
corner of the world, and for but three years in all, 
was His Deity exhibited to human gaze, and then 



120 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

in such wise that few believed it was God. God 
keeps Himself in the distance. No human hand 
can touch Him, nor eye gaze upon His face. Why 
is it so ? Does He not know that we need Him ? 
Why does He not come near ? Does He not hear 
us cry after Him ? Why does He not approach ? 
Why does He not so order His ways that conviction 
should be forced on men ? Why does He not so 
dispose Himself that acquaintance with Him should 
be as easy as acquaintance with our fellow-men ? 
Since the knowledge of God is the deepest need of 
the heart, why is it not put within ready reach ? 
Since the very salvation of the soul depends on ac- 
quaintance with Him, why does He not, if need be, 
burst the heavens to flash His person on our gaze, 
compel belief, and force doubt from the arena ? 
* ' Why standest thou afar off, O Lord ? why hidest 
thou thyself in times of trouble ? " 

These are fair questions, and they demand answer. 
They are common questions, rising from sincere 
lips, born of hearts wrung with anguish ; and what 
shall we say ? 

If God is inscrutable, there are within our reach 
reasons why this must be so : — 

i. There is a class of reasons growing out of 
God's nature. It is the nature of merit to be mod- 
est. Power hides. Your really great men never 
brag. Love conceals its passions. Holiness is re- 
tiring. Justice waits in secret, with sword sheathed, 



GOD INSCRUTABLE: WHY? 121 

until Crime comes along and lays upon it the nec- 
essity of revelation and action. Truth, noto- 
riously, evades our grasp, and leads the searcher 
after it a weary pilgrimage. True goodness refuses 
to flaunt itself before the public. We all know that 
this is so ; these excellences, as seen among men, 
always appear veiled and retiring. And what is 
God but the living source and sum of these attri- 
butes ? "God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and un- 
changeable in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, 
goodness, and truth. " By a necessity of His nat- 
ure, therefore, He cannot but conceal Himself. 

When you see a true philanthropist parading in 
public and courting applause ; when you find the 
sublimest truths of science as accessible as the lies 
of common gossip ; when you observe the rarest 
flowers of human goodness and purity jostling men 
on the street, obtruding themselves on notice ; 
when the highest wisdom of men has lost all mod- 
esty ; when greatness has become synonymous with 
brazen effrontery, — then, perhaps, you may expect 
God to expose His being to constant gaze ; certainly 
not till then. 

Further : man is modest in proportion to his 
greatness, i. e. , his true merit. Distance is the law 
of greatness. You can explore a township inch by 
inch, but thus to explore a continent would over- 
task your powers. From a hill-top your eye may 
range over a few square miles of plain and take in 



122 PA C1FIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

much detail of the surface, but from what post of 
observation will your eye take in the round globe ? 
From the plain you may see the hill-top, but the 
mountain height is wreathed in clouds or capped 
by snow. How, then, can God bring Himself down 
within range of your vision ? It is with vast diffi- 
culty that He reveals Himself even in the face of 
nature and the trend of history ; at greater cost, in 
the lives of His saints, and in the work and worship 
of His church ; at still greater cost, in the human 
language of the Scripture ; and at infinite cost, in 
the person of Jesus Christ. There is an inherent 
difficulty in the way of a better book than the 
Bible, or a clearer Incarnation than that of Jesus. 
Let us not complain of what we have ; it is, we 
may reverently say, the best that God can give. It 
were far easier to create a world than to inspire a 
prophet ; easier to order the ages, governing both 
nature and the kingdoms of men, than to produce 
the prodigious serial of inspired Scripture, or the 
complex vitality of the Christian church with God 
at its heart, and even feebly shining through ; far 
easier to make and guard the universe than to send 
Jesus Christ. It seems probable that the continu- 
ance of our Lord on earth for much longer than 
three and thirty years would have so wrenched the 
nature of things as to have destroyed both man and 
nature in a series of colossal convulsions. Certain 
it is that, though this revelation came among a peo- 



GOD INSCRUTABLE: WHY? 123 

pie specially prepared for the event by fifteen cent- 
uries of specific training and expectation, among the 
fittest people then on the globe to receive it, the 
tragic consequences were with difficulty staved off 
month by month after the first year of His introduc- 
tion to the people. The world could not bear more 
of God then, and it may be doubted if it could en- 
dure Christ's return for even a shorter period now. 
What, then, would have happened had the revela- 
tion been less dim ? 

Greatness cannot but hide ; its head must be 
above the clouds, and its outstretched hands lost 
in the distance. To make mountain tops acces- 
sible to babes would be to destroy the mountain 
tops — not to speak of the babes. To bring God 
into clearer vision would be to annihilate Him. 
And the partial revelations we have, — in con- 
science, in nature, in Providence, in Scripture, in 
the living Christian and the living church, and espe- 
cially in Jesus Christ, — are successive miracles of 
the most stupendous class. To have accomplished 
so much revelation of Himself without destructive 
violence to His own nature must have, as men 
would say, ' ' tasked the brain and taxed the re- 
sources " of Infinity. 

2. There is a class of reasons which directly 
concern the nature of man. If God must respect 
His own nature, so also must He respect that of 
the creatures He has made in His own image. He 



124 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

must leave man scope for activity. There is a 
sense in which there is no room for both God and 
man in the play of life ; there is not room for both 
on the same plane. If man is to work on the 
plane of things visible, God must act on the plane 
of the things invisible. If a visible God were to 
rule the United States, human politics would go 
down with a crash, commerce would hide its head, 
science would be absorbed, invention discounted, 
and literature would retire abashed. There is too 
great a clash of method. God works by perfect 
pattern from the outset, while man gropes his way 
from imperfection to lesser imperfection. Let men 
do their best, yet our work is seamed and scarred 
with unwisdom and frailty ; but God's work is 
always good. Can these two work together ? — 
Not on the same plane. Can a woodsman and a 
beaver work together in felling the same tree ? 
Can an ox and a mole plow in the same furrow ? 
When the ox enters the field, the mole^ must retire, 
or work under cover ; and when man reaches the 
frontier the beaver must emigrate or die. Much 
more, if God should walk among men, man would 
be crowded out. Fancy the chaos of society if 
God were a guest at every tea-party ; what a wreck 
of conversation and of comfort there would be ! 
Or try the political convention, the counting-room, 
even His own church ! Yet under the touch of His 
misee?i Spirit, and the touch of His veiled provi- 



GOD INSCRUTABLE: WHY? 125 

dence, society and state and church may grow up 
to God. The unseen God can bear with human 
frailty in the slow evolution of goodness ; but God 
revealed would ruin man, ipso facto, by exposing 
all our imperfections and correcting all our faults 
at one stroke. The presence of God would para- 
lyze activity, bewilder thought, crush the human 
will, and even extinguish our being, as man is now 
constituted. The veiling of His activity is a price- 
less boon to man. His clearer presence on the 
scene would be the signal for human collapse. 

3. A third class of reasons concerns God's rela- 
tion with man. God wishes to have with us the 
closest relations possible. But to assume too 
much at the outset would be to raise between us 
a barrier perhaps forever impassable. The best 
intimacies, even among men, are marked by a 
fine reserve. And when the intimacy is between a 
nobler and a grosser nature, it is the higher that 
must maintain the reserve ; the lower may be free 
to the uttermost limit, but the higher one must be 
so large as to keep something back without allow- 
ing his companion to miss anything. And espe- 
cially the personal contact must not be too com- 
mon and too constant, or the endearing intimacy 
is wrecked. As a matter of fact, hosts of desirable 
friendships go to pieces on this very rock. 

God gives us of Himself all we are prepared to 
receive. As our spirits absorb His righteousness, 



126 PA CIF1C CO A S T PULPIT. 

we can see Him more clearly. God cannot make 
the mistake of excessive revelations of Himself. 
' ' What fellowship hath light with darkness ? " If 
the glare of day push into the night, it destroys 
the charm of night. The two may meet and touch 
at day-dawn and at twilight ; yes, the sun may 
yield to the night a faint reflected light by way of 
the moon ; and stars may glisten faintly in the sky ; 
but -that is the most that can be done. So God 
holds fellowship with us. And shall we blame 
Him ? As well might night blame and deny the 
distant day, while yet it is the reflection of day, 
and its touch at morn and evening, which dispels 
the horror of the night. 

Further : one look at the unveiled face of God 
would annihilate man. "No man can look on 
God and live." "No man hath seen God at 
any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the 
bosom of the Father, he hath declared him." We 
have the highest revelation compatible with our 
comfort — yes, with our safety. Why do we not 
complain of the sun's distance ? So far off it is that 
its huge bulk seems no bigger than a common 
pumpkin, and men are baffled by the mystery of its 
constitution and its constant blaze. The uncer- 
tainties of scientists about the sun are vastly 
greater than the uncertainties of theologians about 
God. Yet would we have the sun nearer ? Our 
ordinary summer weather furnishes a felt and 
cogent answer : It would burn us up. 



GOD INSCRUTABLE: WHY? 127 

There is such a relation between the sun's light 
and the delicate mechanism of the human eye, and 
between the sun's heat and the delicate structure 
of the human body, and between God's holiness 
and love, and the limited capabilities and the frail- 
ties of man, that distance is our only safety. Were 
man cast-iron, a nearer sun would melt him, and 
were our hearts adamant, a visible, present God 
could not but destroy us by the operation of the 
essential laws of being. But the visible sun in the 
distance, almost hidden, reveals himself by light 
and heat ; and the unseen God, standing afar off, 
blesses us by the rays of truth and goodness and 
beauty which appear in Christ and the Bible and 
conscience and good men. 

A God too plainly revealed would shrivel the 
moral sense, instead of stimulating its growth. As 
plants grow toward the sun, because the distant 
sun is not too hot, so, in a grander way, man must 
rise to God. The search for God is a needed dis- 
cipline. A too patent presence of God would 
empty us of merit. The essential task, the line of 
moral progress, lies in searching after the unseen 
God. It is true, as Jesus said, that if men ' ' hear 
not Moses and the prophets neither will they be- 
lieve though one rise from the dead." Faith be- 
comes impossible when everything is plainly seen. 
The education of man is along the line of discov- 
ery. With special emphasis must this be true in 
the highest of all educations — the culture of the 



128 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

soul in morals. The line of duty is in the line of 
church-going, prayer, Bible-reading, and devout 
living. The boy who waits to study geology until 
the science is finished and the complete cabinet 
arranged, will die a numskull ; and the man who 
waits for religion, till religion becomes plain and 
perfect beyond dispute, will die unsaved. God's 
plan is now adjusted to our capacities ; and every 
hour's delay in becoming a Christian is an hour of 
perilous crime. 

4. A fourth class of reasons is based on the es- 
sential methods of creation and redemption alike. 
I name but one — evolution ; or rather, develop- 
ment. 

God never grows. He can only compress Him- 
self until He touches us — as in Bible, Christ, or 
Christian. But His creation begins at the other 
end. All His work begins small, and grows to full- 
ness. The seed becomes the oak. The babe be- 
comes a man. The mind expands. The three 
chapters of Genesis were germinant, and have 
grown to the complete Bible. The church, at first 
embodied in Abraham and his family, shall grow till 
it becomes the perfected bride of Christ. And the 
idea of revelation, beginning with the visit and the 
sacrifice at the gate of Eden, grew through the ages 
till Christ came, — the highest revelation so far 
known. But the end is not yet. Since then the 
Christ is becoming better understood. Presently 



GOD INSCRUTABLE: WHY? 129 

another epoch will arrive, and in glory He shall re- 
turn, more fully revealing the Father ; and through- 
out eternity the revelation will grow clearer and 
clearer to the eyes of the redeemed, as we grow 
ready to receive the clearer revelations. 

" Ah ! heaven I deem no place of mystic charm, 
Languid, or rapturous ; — but a limitless sphere, 
Wherein the uncarnate spirit still must dare, 

Strive, conquer still, — but with ethereal arms. 

" No lotus-flowers, out-breathing slumber, nod 
O'er the clear waters of that world sublime ; 
Heights rise on heights, the ransomed soul must climb, 

Yearning to view the unveiled face of God." 

5. Sin aggravates the difficulty. It is of the nat- 
ure of sin to confuse the judgment, to blunt or per- 
vert the perceptions, and especially to dull or even 
paralyze the moral vision. The uncleansed con- 
science has lost affinity for God. Our sins arise in 
unwholesome exhalations, like a cloud to thicken 
the moral atmosphere and blot the Sun of Right- 
eousness from our sky. It is a marvel that divine 
grace has found a way to penetrate this thick dark- 
ness. The wonders of salvation include this most 
difficult achievement, which must redound to the 
glory of the God of all grace. Only infinite skill 
could have devised and accomplished this. It is a 
fact that sinners are brought face to face with God, 
under specific operations of the Holy Spirit, The 



130 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

light is forced into the darkened heart. Even the 
hardened sinner is brought so far into acquaintance 
with the living God as to have the motives of right- 
eousness given vigorous play at the bar of the will, 
in holy persuasion, and often in effectual calling, 
uniting the soul to Christ and lifting it into perma- 
nent fellowship with the Father and Son. 

Let us, then, not murmur. God is as near us as 
our interests permit. In fact, He is not far away. 
He merely acts on a different plane. Not the 
thickness of tissue paper lies between the throbbing 
heart of humanity and the Father's sympathizing 
ear and helping hand. His ear is open to our cry, 
and no cry goes out to Him in vain. 




REV. H. W. K ETC HUM, D. D. 



CHRIST'S CHALLENGE AND QUESTION TO 
UNBELIEVERS. 



BY REV. H. A. KETCHUM, D. D. 

Pastor First Church, Berkeley, California. 



Which of you convinceth me of sin? and if I say the truth, 
why do ye not believe me? John 8: 46. 

The words of the text occur in the midst of a 
heated and exciting discussion. The Pharisees on 
the one hand were angry, almost if not quite to mad- 
ness ; for Jesus had just said to them, "Ye are of 
your father the devil, and the lusts of your father 
ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, 
and abode not in the truth, because there is no 
truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speak- 
eth of his own ; for he is a liar, and the father of it. " 

Rather plain language, this, for these men to 
hear, who boasted that they were not as other men. 
They fasted twice in the week and gave tithes of all 
that they possessed. And Jesus adds : ' ' Because I 
tell you the truth, ye believe me not." "Which 
of you convinceth me of sin ? And if I say the truth, 
why do ye not believe me ? He that is of God hear- 

[131] 



132 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

eth God's words ; ye therefore hear them not, be- 
cause ye are not of God." Their anger has now 
reached white heat, and they answer sharply : ' ' Say 
we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a 
devil ? " 

Jesus was calm and dignified throughout this in- 
tense discussion. His language was severe ; but 
that it was justified, and that the circumstance de- 
manded this severity, who, after the lapse of eight- 
een centuries, will question for a moment ? ' ' Which 
of you convinceth me of sin ?" This is surely a re- 
markable challenge ; and it was a challenge not 
only to these Pharisees and scribes, but to the 
whole world, and for all time. 

This challenge either justifies men in their unbe- 
lief and rejection of Christ, or it condemns them for 
such unbelief and rejection in the sight of God, an- 
gels, and men. 

Let us carefully consider, first, what is involved 
in the challenge, and, secondly, what is involved in 
the question. 

Before proceeding with this discussion, however, 
permit me to remind you that under the auspices of 
the Y. M. C. A., this week is sacred to the interests 
of young men. All churches and all Christians are 
most earnestly requested to pray for young men ; 
pray in the closet, at the family altar, in the 
church, on the street, — everywhere, — without 
ceasing ; pray for the young men of this and other 



CHRIST'S CHALLENGE TO UNBELIEVERS. 133 

lands. Why ? — First, for their own salvation, 
their present and future ; their temporal and eternal 
welfare. 

Secondly, for the nation's good. When the 
prophet sent word to Ahab that the mighty hosts 
of the Syrians, under Benhadad, should be deliv- 
ered into his hands that day, and Ahab inquired by 
whom, the prophet replied, ' ' By the young men of 
the princes of the provinces." 

In our country, especially, the people are the 
power ; and we can be safe and prosperous as a 
nation only when the voice of the people is an 
echo of the voice of God. If the voice of the 
people is the voice of God, then let the people re- 
joice ; but if not, then let the people mourn. 

Thirdly, pray for the young men because upon 
them, under God, depends the welfare of the 
church and of the world. Well may the people of 
God, sitting upon the watch-towers of Zion, in- 
quire as did king David, ' ' Is the young man 
safe ? " For if he be safe, the country, the family, 
the church, and the nation are safe. 

And now to return to our theme : — 

I. What is involved in the unparalleled challenge 
which Christ sent forth to the unbelieving Pharisees 
and an unbelieving world, ' ' Which of you con- 
vinceth me of sin ? " 

The challenge is broad in its scope — broad as 
the world and far-reaching as eternity. The word 



134 PA CIFIC CO A ST P UL PIT. 

1 ' sin " is generic. It is a very short word, only three 
letters, but oh what a tap-root of suffering, sorrow, 
shame, and self-destruction ! 

"Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit 
Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste 
Brought death unto the world, and all our woe, 
With loss of Eden, till one greater Man 
Restore us and regain the blissful seat, 
Sing heavenly Muse." 

' ' Sin is any want of conformity unto, or trans- 
gression of, the law of God." Hence Jesus Christ 
claimed to have conformed to and perfectly obeyed 
the law of God. This was a startling, a stupen- 
dous claim. Whether these men could convict Him 
or not, it was an assumption unprecedented, and 
unparalleled in the history of mankind, and one 
that would be most hateful in the sight of heaven 
unless warranted and justified by eternal truth. 

Jesus Christ upon this challenge rests the whole 
question of His claim to be the promised Messiah ; 
His claims upon the confidence, the faith, the obe- 
dience, and love of men. It was as much as to say : 
' ' Convict me of sin and I will admit that you are 
right, that you are justified in disbelieving me, in 
rejecting me, in killing me, which you are trying so 
hard to do. Bring forth your witnesses now, pro- 
duce your testimony ; summon your ablest counsel ; 
convict me of one sin and the case shall be yours ; 



CHRIST'S CHALLENGE TO UNBELIEVERS. 135 

the world shall know that I am wrong and you are 
right." 

Consider, further, that they were not under the 
necessity of convicting Christ of some great, hei- 
nous, blood-curdling crime. Not at all ! One little 
sin, one failure, one mistake, one act, one word, 
one hint, intimation, or insinuation that was not in 
perfect harmony with the law of God, would have 
been sufficient. And most assiduously did they try 
to entangle Him in His talk. They were masters 
at cross-questioning. The question, "Is it lawful 
to give tribute unto Caesar ? " involved the whole 
theory of political economy. 

Here, on the one hand, was the whole Jewish 
Sanhedrim of seventy-one men ; yea, more, the 
whole Jewish nation, with here and there a rare ex- 
ception. These scribes and Pharisees, moreover, 
were wise men, learned men, men of ripe erudition 
and experience. They knew the law and the 
prophets, and the Psalms as you know the Lord's 
prayer or the Golden Rule. They were the teach- 
ers, the s scholars, the critics of their day. 

On the other hand, here was a young man only 
thirty-two years of age. He had been brought up 
in obscurity in His humble home in Nazareth. So 
far as we know He never went to school a day in 
His life. He probably assisted His father, who 
was a carpenter. Up to the age of thirty, we know 



136 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

not that He ever traveled five miles from His home, 
with a single exception, when at the age of twelve 
He went with His parents to Jerusalem. 

True, He was a wonderful observer and lover of 
nature. Nothing escaped His notice. Birds and 
animals, flowers and trees, were His companions. 
He had no intercourse with great men. Thirty 
years of His life of thirty-three, were spent in the 
despised town of Nazareth, and in the seclusion of 
one of its most secluded homes. Even good old 
Nathanael, in whom there was no guile, questioned 
whether any good thing could come out of Nazareth. 

Never did one have such insufficient grounds, 
from a merely human standpoint, for such stupen- 
dous claims ; a teacher of teachers ; a champion of 
righteousness ; an infallible expounder of inspired 
truth ; a Man who challenged the united wisdom, 
cunning, skill, learning, and experience of His gen- 
eration to find in Him one sin, one fault, one error, 
one mistake. Stupendous claim, indeed ! Let His 
enemies, His accusers, stand reverently before this 
unparalleled challenge. 

But this is not all. That challenge has been be- 
fore the world for almost 1900 years. Many have 
run to and fro, knowledge has been increased. His- 
tory has filled mighty archives with its volumes ; 
prophecy has been unfolded and fulfilled ; nations 
have arisen to illustrious eminence, only to decline 
and become extinct. Multiplied lives of Christ 



CHRIST'S CHALLENGE TO UNBELIEVERS. 137 

have been written by both friends and foes ; science 
has unfolded her wonders ; philosophy has dropped 
its plummet to depths hitherto undreamed of ; — the 
world throbs with thoughts that thrill the soul with 
possibilities almost infinitely greater than present 
realization. 

Ten thousand calcium lights are focused upon 
the life, word, and works of Jesus Christ, and still 
the challenge remains ; still the humble Man of 
Nazareth stands before the world's tribunal of the 
greatest scholars, multiplied from seventy to ten 
thousand times seventy, saying : ' ' Which of you 
convinceth me of sin, of error, of mistake of any 
kind, form, or feature ? " 

Young men of America, do you appreciate the 
significance of that challenge ? Why do not our 
daily papers sometimes give this challenge a place 
in their columns ? They gladly publish the chal- 
lenges of pugilists, foot-ball, and base-ball teams ; 
wheel riders, lawn-tennis players, athletes and pe- 
destrians. Why not publish, and write an editorial 
occasionally upon the challenge of all challenges, — 
that means so much to a lost world. 

Listen, O wise men of the earth, — lawyers, phil- 
osophers, teachers, scholars, scientists, men of 
thought, of knowledge, of experience, — listen to a 
challenge that is fraught with incomparable signifi- 
cance to every man, a voice that comes from One 
who said, "I am the light of the world;" ''Before 



138 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Abraham was, I am ; " "I am the way, the truth, 
and the life;" "No man cometh unto the Father 
but by me ;" "I am the water of life ;" "I am the 
bread of life ;" "I am the resurrection and the life." 
Listen to that voice ; it speaks to you, to me, to 
all. ' 'Which of you convinceth me of sin ? And if I 
say the truth, why do ye not believe me,?" 

Gospel hearer, that challenge has never been 
met, has never been answered ; never will be, never 
can be answered. Jesus Christ stands before the 
world's tribunal to-day unimpeached, and unim- 
peachable. Not one sin, not one error, not one 
mistake, not one flaw in His life, character, word, 
or works, has ever beer; shown. His word is ever- 
lasting, invulnerable truth. ' ' In the beginning was 
the Word, and the Word was with God, and the 
Word was God. The same was in the beginning 
with God. All things were made by him ; and 
without him was not anything made that was made. 
In him was life ; and the life was the light of men." 
11 And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among 
us, " — ' ' Immamicl. " 

II. And now the second question growing out of 
the text. 

What is involved in Christ's question : ' ' And if I 
say the truth, why do ye not believe me ? " To 
those who do believe Christ, and whose daily lives 
confirm the declaration that they do believe Him, 
this question, of course, does not apply. Do not 



CHRIST'S CHALLENGE TO UNBELIEVERS. 139 

fail, dear brother and sister, to consider well what 
such belief implies and involves. Obedience, love, 
loyalty to, and cheerful service for Christ, will and 
must follow such belief. ' ' Blessed are they that 
have not seen, and yet have believed." 

There are reasons to fear, however, that were 
Jesus speaking to this audience to-day, He would 
be compelled to say as He did when preaching in 
the synagogue at Capernaum, ' ' But there are some 
of you that believe not. " 

If that be so, dear hearer, let me press upon you 
the question of our text: "If I speak the truth, 
why do ye not believe me ? " 

It surely cannot be because truth is not on the 
side of Christ. " I am the truth" are the words 
of Christ ; and for nearly 1900 years that claim 
has not been disproved. Does not unbelief of 
Christ involve a lack of candor, of honor, of truth- 
fulness ? Jesus said : ' ' He that is not with me is 
against me, and he that gathereth not with me 
scattereth abroad." 

Not to believe Jesus Christ, then, is as much as 
to say that a lie is better than the truth. Is any 
young man prepared to say that ? Do not forget 
that one lie has swept this earth with a flood-tide 
of sorrow, suffering, and shame for six thousand 
years. If there be anything which God and 
angels hate above another, and which men ought 
to hate with superlative hatred, it is a lie. The 



140 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

very quintessence of devilry, of infamy, the very 
breath of demons is a lie ; it is most foreign to 
heaven, and most congenial to hell, the bastile of 
the lost. 

Not to believe Christ is to join with those hypo- 
critical Pharisees in saying to Christ that He has a 
devil ; for God's Word declares that, ' ' He that be- 
lieveth not God, hath made him a liar." And 
Jesus Christ, while upon the earth, was "God 
manifest in the flesh." With deepest solemnity 
and reverence it needs to be said right here that 
the alternative is inevitable. Jesus Christ was 
either the Son of God, the God of "truth, or like 
Elymas He was a child of the devil, who is the 
father of lies. 

O young men, is there any question in your 
minds as to which side of this question demands 
your confidence, and deserves your belief ? Listen 
once more to the voice of Him who spake as never 
man spake ; who spake as one having authority 
and not as the scribes ; who ' ' spake and it was 
done," who "commanded and it stood fast ; " "who 
speaks, and eternity, filled with His voice, re-echoes 
the praise of her Lord." 

' ' Which of you convinceth me of sin ? " ' 4 And if 
I say the truth, why do ye not believe me ? " Dear 
young men of this congregation, are you prepared 
to answer the question which Jesus Christ lays be- 
fore you in the text ? Let me earnestly ask you to 



CHRIST'S CHALLENGE TO UNBELIEVERS. 141 

be as honest, as manly, as unequivocal in answer- 
ing this question, as you would be were the ques- 
tion submitted to you : Which is better, the truth 
or a lie ? 

That indeed is the real significance of this latter 
part of the text. "If I say the truth," says Jesus 
Christ, — and the verdict of the world after two 
thousand years' trial is that Jesus Christ does say 
the truth, — "why do ye not believe me?" Are 
you, then, ready to say, "I do believe Jesus 
Christ?" If so, I praise God for it, and rejoice 
with you. 

I beg of you to consider well what such belief 
implies, and involves, — immediate committal of 
yourself to Jesus Christ to be saved, and accept- 
ance of Him as your Saviour. It involves, also, 
prompt and perpetual obedience to Jesus Christ as 
your King. Then labor ; for love and loyalty to 
Christ will inevitably follow, as your chief desire 
and supreme delight. May God help you to recog- 
nize the obligation, and to meet it manfully for 
Christ's sake. Amen. 



A LIFE RETROSPECT. 



BY REV. HENRY COLLIN MINTON, D. D. , 

Professor of Dogmatic Theology in the Theological Seminary, San Anselmo, Cal. 



/ have glorified thee on the earth; I have finished the 
work which thou gavest me to do. John ij :^. 

The life of Jesus is now drawing near to its close. 
His errand is almost performed ; His mission is al- 
most accomplished ; His work almost done. He 
turns away from His confidential conversation with 
His disciples to a more sacred interview with His 
Father. Alone, He pours out His soul in prayer to 
God. He finds sweet relief and welcome rest in 
communion with Him. No man understands Him. 
He is alone in all the world. God only sees Him 
as He is, and His heart is filled with confidence and 
rising courage as He speaks to Him in prayer. 

Men misunderstand Him ; the world hates Him ; 
the Jews are about to crucify Him ; He treads the 
wine-press alone, and this very solitude would tend 
to freeze up the warm fountains of human affection 
in His breast. 

What holy joy there is to Him in knowing that 
God's eye sees Him through and through, God's ear 
[142] . 




REV. H. C. MINTON, D. D. 



A LIFE RETROSPECT. 143 

hears His earnest cry, and, whatever man may say, 
God's favor rests upon His consecrated life ! 

So it is that the text gives us the calm retrospect 
of a well-spent life. No accent of sadness, no tone 
of complaining, no suggestion of gloom ; thirty- 
three short years and the end comes. Evening 
shades fall at noon-time. Death claims the vigor 
of His manhood, the strength of His courage, the 
prime fruit of His life. Well and good ! "I have 
glorified thee on the earth ; I have finished the 
work which thou gavest me to do." 

These words present to us the two needful ele- 
ments in every true Christian life. Our Lord was 
divine, but He was also human. Our life should be 
in a thousand ways like His, — a life of business, a 
life of usefulness, a life of trust, a life of love. 

The first of these two elements is that of glorify- 
ing God. "I have glorified thee on the earth." 
Every noble life contributes to the Father's glory. 
The light must so shine as to lead men to glorify 
not us, but our Father which is in heaven. We 
should be humble finger-boards along the ways of 
life to point men's thoughts and guide men's feet 
toward God. 

Nor is this a strange notion when we reflect a 
moment. He made us and not we ourselves. The 
breath of life is the gift of God. Every good thing 
is of His bounty. Every energy we possess, every 
instrument we employ, — everything is His, not 



1 44 /'- / CIFIC CO AS 7 ' PUL PIT. 

ours. The creature is created to do the Creator's 
will, and in this simple truth is wrapped up the true 
philosophy of every human life. 

But what is it to glorify God ? What is His 
glory ? The Westminster Fathers said, ' ' Man's 
chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him for- 
ever." Here we dip beyond our depth, and rise 
beyond our height. God's glory is too great, too 
grand a thought for you and me. In the abstract 
we can know nothing of the essential glory of the 
infinite and the absolute. But in the fields and 
forces of nature, in the doings and developments of 
Providence as traced on the pages of the past, and 
in the marvels and triumphs of redeeming grace, 
we find always and everywhere that the glory of the 
living God is set forth as that which is the highest 
good of all His creatures. 

I know that I am now groping amid mysteries 
too deep and dark. I know that no man can com- 
prehend the thought, or compass the purpose of 
the Almighty. I know that humility does well to 
seal her lip in the presence of problems which no 
finite wisdom can grasp or solve. Still, amid the 
dazzling flashes of ancient Sinai, by the silent 
Shekinah lights of the tabernacle and the temple, 
and in the blinding mists that envelop the cross 
uplifted on the brow of Calvary, we find the glory 
of the Lord ever in mercy condescending to iden- 
tify itself with the highest well-being of His creat- 



A LIFE RETROSPECT. 145 

ures, and lighting up, with Heaven's radiant beams, 
the lives and destinies of His lonely children. 

I know not how, I know not why, sin has come 
in. " An enemy hath done this." Death invades 
the joyous realms of life. The songs of- joy are 
sadly mingled with the sighs of sorrow. The 
yawning grave waits to entrap the child of mirth, 
and darker destinies await the future of the wicked 
and hopelessly impenitent. God knows best. Cer- 
tainly it is a tangled web now. Perhaps sin is 
needful for us to resist if we would attain the 
highest virtue. God only knows ; but we do know 
that on every page of this blessed Book, He invites 
and urges all men to come to Him. He calls the 
thirsty to come to Him for drink, the hungry to 
come to Him for meat, the weary to come to Him 
for rest, and by countless proofs and signs that he 
who runs may read and mistake not, He always 
links the highest glory with our highest good. 

The catechism is right. To glorify God is to 
enjoy Him. Heaven is not good at the expense of 
Earth, nor Eternity better by making Time worse. 
The God of the Christian's Bible is no Moloch that 
gloats upon the sufferings and sorrows of his creat- 
ures. ' ' Turn ye, turn ye ; why will ye die ? " 
God's desire is that all men should be saved. 

Drop the mysteries of the infinite, my breth- 
ren, and we find the lives of simple duty here. 
Leave the transcendent for this once to the 
10 



146 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Emersons and the Carlyles, and we glean a lumi- 
nous lesson from this thought. We glorify God 
when we do our best. We glorify God when we 
honor our conscience. We glorify God when we 
reach our highest. Then we magnify every oppor- 
tunity and squander nothing. The tiny flower 
glorifies God with its sweet and modest fragrance. 
The mighty mountain glorifies God in its towering 
and majestic grandeur. The merry bird glorifies 
God with its lovely plumage and dainty song. 

The trees in the field glorify God with their 
fragrant blossoms to-day and their loads of golden 
fruit to-morrow. The myriad stars in the mid- 
night astronomies of the sky glorify God and 
show forth His handiwork. Every creature glori- 
fies its Creator by being that and doing that for 
which it was created. Put any man in the right 
place ; give him the right work ; and in that place 
and by that work that man is glorifying God. Let 
his hand but follow its cunning, let his heart but 
obey its longings with a worthy purpose and a lofty, 
unselfish aim, and God's glory is the end that will 
be secured. 

But linked with this one element is one other : 
' ' I have finished the work which thou gavest me 
to do." And yet this is not another but only a dif- 
ferent side of the same. Jesus glorified the Father 
by doing the work which the Father gave Him to 
do. Here is one of the grandest truths the mind 






A LIFE RETROSPECT, 147 

of man can reflect upon. A man's work is worthy 
of himself only when it is God's work. The Son of 
Mary lived a perfect life because He perfectly did 
his Father's work. ' ' Wist ye not that I must be 
about my Father's business ? " ' f My meat is to do 
the will of him that sent me. " ' ' Lo, I come ; in 
the volume of the book it is written of me, I de- 
light to do thy will O my God. " God gives every 
man in this world a work to do. The breath of 
life is a commission to work. A lazy man is a barren 
fig-tree, — "Why cumbereth it the ground?" No 
man lives who has not a work to do, and no other 
man can do his work ; so that if he leaves it undone, 
it is undone to all eternity. 

The first condition of doing this work well is to 
realize that God has given us this work to do. 
Talk of success in life ! Here is the secret and 
well-spring of all true success. The man who is 
wholly dependent upon God is the only man in all 
the world who can afford to be wholly independent 
of all other men. Money is nothing, honor is 
nothing, fame is nothing when compared with this 
consciousness every day that we are pegging away, 
pegging away, and pegging away at the work God 
has given us to do. It matters not so much what it 
is. To be sure, it must be clean and honest and 
honorable, and in itself a blessing and not a curse. 
But the motive gives dignity to the service. Plow 
the soil, only plow it deep and well. Measure 



148 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

calico, only measure thirty-six inches to every yard. 
Pound the anvil, only take care that you pound out 
something. Bake bread, only bake it well and 
make it good. Teach your pupils, only see to it 
that you teach them something worth the learning. 
Preach your sermon, only keep quiet until you 
have made sure that your sermons are not your 
own but the very truth of God. This, that, any- 
thing, — only make sure that you are doing the 
work God would have you do, and then be sure 
that all will be well. I pity the man who is at the 
wrong work in life, — a fish out of water, a bird 
with clipped wing essaying to fly through the air ! 
The carpenter in the pulpit, the preacher at the 
anvil, the lawyer with the yard-stick, the merchant 
on the bench ! it is hard to glorify God and do His 
work with such a misfit as that. It is hard to 
glorify God by doing another man's work. 

You may say that I am degrading the sacredness 
of the text ; but am I ? It is true, the word of our 
blessed Lord was awfully sacred, transcendently 
sublime ; but with us life is a most matter-of-fact 
work-a-day thing. Not many of us are called to 
lay the foundations of an empire ; not many of us 
are called to be missionaries to the heathen or even 
ministers of the gospel. Our religion is valueless 
unless it comes down to the level of our daily life. 
And, indeed, our lives are dignified by this con- 
sciousness within that we are doing God's work, day 



A LIFE RETROSPECT. 149 

after day. Let the years come and go, let life 
bring its changes of sorrow and joy, let the seasons 
roll on in quick and swift succession, I am doing all 
I can do, as God's pathway opens up before me like 
a sunbeam from the sky. The seal of His call is 
fixed within my breast. Let men bear or forbear, 
let the world find fault or praise, let evil report or 
good report go forth, I know my work. There is 
no misunderstanding with my employer ; I am not 
groping in the mists ; I am obeying a distinct call 
that rings out in my soul, and I am following in the 
footsteps of Him who glorified His Father and fin- 
ished the work God had given Him to do. 

Brethren, that conviction may well defy a solid 
world. That consciousness can smile at all the 
gold in the bowels of the Sierras. There is blessed 
and complete abandonment of self to God in that. 
If I succeed, the glory is His, not mine. If I fail, 
the responsibility of my failure is with Him that 
placed me here. The results are His. And I may 
justly claim the wages He has taught us to expect : 
"Give us this day our daily bread." I spend the 
strength it gives me in Thy service. I know no 
other service than Thine own. I am not my own, 
I am bought with a price, even the precious blood 
of Christ. 

Do you say this is too high for us — we cannot at- 
tain to it ? Not so ; my brethren, God's name is 
Immanuel, — ' < God with us. " He called Abram from 



150 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

ancient Ur of the Chaldees to go forth to a land 
whither he knew not ; and because he in simplicity 
obeyed, he became Abraham, the Father of the 
faithful. He called the shepherd boy from his flocks 
on the plains of Bethlehem ; and obeying, David 
became the reigning King of Israel. His angel 
appeared to humble Mary in her lowly home at 
Nazareth ; and because his wondrous promise was 
believed, the Jewish Virgin became the blessed 
among women — the mother of the world's Re- 
deemer. Saul of Tarsus was prostrated by a bolt 
of Gods lightning from the heavens, and with 
sightless orbs the chastened persecutor could only 
ask, ' ' Lord, what wilt thou have me to do ? " 

Brother man, we must have this call to do God's 
work or we are a failure, a miserable failure, and 
nothing but a failure in life. No man is worth a 
farthing till God's call wakes him up. The reason 
why .there are so many worthless failures all about 
us, the reason why the world is cursed with so 
many blighted careers and blasted lives on every 
side, is simply because men's ears do not listen to 
the call that comes from God, men's eyes are closed 
against the heavenly vision that awaits their seeing, 
men's hearts do not respond to the summons that 
is voiced in the inviting field, the ripening harvest, 
and the heavenly reward that, in this famed age 
above all other ages, tempts manhood and woman- 
hood for their best. 



A LIFE RETROSPECT. 151 

But there is a tone of pathos in the words of the 
text. Thirty-three years round out a short life in- 
deed. And yet our Saviour could say, ' ' I have fin- 
ished the work." Biography is measured by deeds 
and not by years. His work was done, His mission 
was ended. Some men have been said to live too 
long, and to have undone in part the good that in 
earlier years they had accomplished. What matters 
it, my friends, when the summons comes, if only 
our work is done and well done ? Ah ! what a re- 
ward is there in such a retrospect as this ! Death 
never comes too early to the man who is at his 
work. God makes no mistakes. The promoted 
workman does not suffer, and we may trust God to 
take care of His work. 

Some men, by God's grace, seem to win their re- 
ward sooner than others. Death seems sad if it 
breaks in upon an unfinished work ; but who knows ? 
Only let us be about our Father's business ; only 
let us follow in the footsteps of our Lord in the 
shadows of the valley as well as in the sunshine of 
the hilltops ; only let us do with our might what 
our hands find to do ; and then, whether the end 
come late in life, or on the threshold of life's ma- 
turer years, or in the dewy morn of early youth, 
we may say with the blessed Christ himself, in the 
consciousness of His favor and the assurance of His 
reward, ' ' I have finished the work which thou gav- 
est me to do." 



152 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

In a silent, lonely country in the far-away 
heathen city of Lucknow, among the historic scen- 
eries of western India, by the old residence which 
was blasted by shells and ruined by the fearful Sepo^ 
rebellion of 1857, I have stood by the grave of Sir 
Henry Lawrence, who was in command of the Eng- 
lish forces during those long and trying weeks, — a 
brave soldier, a faultless commander, a Christian 
hero. ' A plain marble slab marks his resting-place 
beneath the sod, and the only epitaph I found upon 
his tomb was that which he himself had dictated : 
"Here lies Henry Lawrence. He tried to do his 
duty." No title with tawdry honor adorns his name. 
No showy parade of his brilliant acts or brave 
achievements, — none of that. Modest as it is, 
could there be a nobler tribute to a valiant Christian 
hero ? And, best of all, the whole world knows 
that it is true. God grant that, by His grace, we 
may all so live that when some eye in the now 
misty future years shall read the inscription on our 
tombs, it may have been inscribed by the hands of 
affectionate gratitude and in the eulogy of simple 
truth, ' ' By God's grace, he tried to do his duty. " 




REV. ROBERT MACKENZIE, D. D. 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 



A DEDICATION SERMON BY REV. ROBERT 

MACKENZIE, D. D. , 

Pastor First Presbyterian Church, San Francisco, California, and Professor of 
Homiletics, etc., in the Theological Seminary, San Anselmo, California. 



The Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. 
Rev. 13 : 8. 

You have long and practically considered the 
outward form and meaning of this church. In 
these it eloquently speaks for itself. Let me to- 
day turn your attention to its inner purpose and 
meaning, to the foundation on which it rests ; to 
the central truth of which it is the exponent. For 
this text leads us to the central theme of the gos- 
pel which is here to be preached — vicarious suf- 
fering. 

Underneath the Sierra Nevada there runs from 
north to south a vein of gold-bearing quartz, which 
miners call the mother-lode. Here and there 
along the range it appears on the surface. Be- 
ginning at that point they dig down and find the 
precious metal. Vicarious suffering runs beneath 
all the Bible as a mother-lode. In this text it 

[153] 



154 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

rises to the surface with a slope and trend that will 
lead us to the foundation of all saving truth. 

The word ' ' vicarious " means one acting or suf- 
fering for another. We as Christians depend for 
our salvation, not on anything we have done or 
suffered, but on something which has been vicari- 
ously done and suffered for us by the Lord Jesus 
Christ, ' ' the Lamb slain. " 

As vicarious sacrifice is the mother-lode of the 
Bible so the cross of Christ is the richest vein in the 
range. It is the one place where it becomes con- 
spicuous and certain. Prophets and priests had 
long studied the ways of God with man, and knew 
that somewhere and at some time the divine pur- 
pose and method of redemption would rise into defi- 
nite and abiding shape. Croppings of the great 
truth were constantly found to cheer their search 
and to buoy their hopes. But these all died not 
having received the promises, but having seen them 
afar off, and were persuaded of them and embraced 
them. But now he hath ' ' made known unto us 
the mystery of his will ; that in the dispensation of 
the fullness of times he might gather in one all 
things in Christ." 

That which prophet and priest had for age after 
age looked to see and had not seen, at last appeared 
in the cross of Jesus. The mother-lode definitely 
and conspicuously revealed itself in the sight of all 
men. When Paul and John speak of it, it is with the 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 155 

rapture of those who discover something for which 
men have long looked. Abraham and Moses and 
Isaiah had watched the growing purpose of God as 
men watch some slow growing tree, wondering what 
flower and fruit it would finally bear, but died before 
the century plant came to the blossom. Paul and 
John, however, found the great plant in full bloom 
in the cross of Christ. Henceforth their words are 
all eloquent with it, their theology is based on it, 
their faith clings to it, their enthusiasm is awakened 
only by it. They determined to know nothing but 
Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. The cross was the 
final solution of the whole problem of God's pur- 
pose and method in man's salvation. But there 
are those who stumble at this central doctrine. 
They do not become Christians because, they say, 
they cannot accept this truth of vicarious suffering. 
They ask why there should be a Bible, a Saviour, 
and a cross ? Why should the salvation of one be by 
the sacrifice of another ? Why should there be the 
tragedy of Calvary, with its agony and darkness 
and earthquake and blood, simply to lead a soul to 
the worship of God ? In a word, why should the 
salvation of one be by the suffering of another ? 
This seems to them to be quite aside from the nat- 
ural order of things and the ordinary experience of 
men. 

The answer to that question is found in the fact 
that the cross of Christ is not altogether unique ; 



156 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

not something entirely different from the preceding 
course of God's method in earthly history ; but the 
full development of a process that, according to our 
text, began with the foundation of the world. The 
cross is not something foisted in upon the divine 
course of events, but something which grew up in 
accordance with its basal law ; not a post, but a 
tree which has its roots wrapped about all great 
events in earthly history and its tap-root deeply 
imbedded in the center and core of the world. 
The Lamb was slain from the foundation of the 
world. 

Let us then trace the roots of the cross to the 
" foundation of the world." The metaphysicians 
in theology would say that this word ' ' world " 
means that the cross has its roots in the eternal 
purpose of God. Doubtless that is the ultimate 
fact. But we might get swamped trying to follow 
these giants through that metaphysical side of the 
theme. I prefer to illustrate it from a side more 
within our reach. 

I. Let this material earth be the ' ' world " of 
our text. The roots of the cross go to the founda- 
tion of it. For a long time the students of nature 
were busy with the circumference of the earth ; 
eager men traveled over continents to discover new 
rivers or mountains ; or crossed seas to discover 
new continents. In our day it is the center of the 
earth, the beginning of it, the "foundations of the 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 157 

world," that are the object of their eagerness. In 
the course of their discoveries in that direction 
some of them have assiduously attacked the Cross. 

Finding it yonder set up in the rocks about Je- 
rusalem they have dug about it to undermine it and 
let it fall as the last symbol of superstition. They 
have given repeated warnings to us who have taken 
refuge in it to stand from under, lest we be crushed 
beneath its falling weight. But the deeper they 
have gone, the more they have revealed the massive 
quality of the roots by which it stands, roots that 
so far, penetrate deeper than their farthest search. 

Let the more common rocks, those nearest the 
surface, be ' ' the foundation of the world. " Let us 
examine them, and let us begin right where the 
Roman soldier is digging the hole in which to set 
up the cross. As we do so, we find it is limestone. 
But what is limestone ? Examine it and you will 
find that it is a grave, a cemetery, filled with myr- 
iad shells of extinct life. Take a piece of it and 
draw a line on the blackboard. Under a micro- 
scope every grain of that white line is a skeleton. All 
that rock was once instinct with life that roamed 
the sea in pearly shells, or crept in the ooze of 
oceans all unknown. They filled their purpose, died, 
and fell to the bottom of those ancient oceans ; and 
thus for years untold and in multitudes beyond our 
arithmetic to number, until in the fullness of His 
time God upheaved the sea bottom, and it became 



158 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

dry land. And that limestone appears not only 
here and there, but all over the earth. The great 
globe itself which we inhabit is all one vast burying 
ground, thick with the dust of departed millions. 

There are places where it appears more promi- 
nently, and one of these is the mountains round 
about Jerusalem, where the Roman soldier dug the 
hole for the cross of Christ. Standing there by that 
soldier as he throws up the crumbling fragments, we 
can say with the poet : — 

" Tell me, thou dust beneath my feet, — 
Thou dust that once had breath, — 
Tell me how many mortals meet 
In this small hill of death ? 

" By wafting winds and flooding rains, 
From ocean, earth, and sky 
Collected, here the frail remains 
Of slumbering millions lie." 

Thus living beings struggled, suffered, and died in 
numbers and through ages utterly beyond our abil- 
ity to count. With what purpose ? Was all this 
life and struggle and suffering in idle wantonness ? 
Was it chance ? Was it pain without any worthy 
purpose ? That would be an awful doctrine to 
teach or believe. Nay, every tiny shell had its 
purpose ; every ephemeral form had its work ; 
every pang of suffering had its meaning ; every 
agony of death in that limestone looked to some 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 159 

great result. What was it ? Stand in front of 
any sea cliff and read the answer. You will see 
that one age of life came and suffered and died to 
make a fitting platform on which another could ac- 
complish its mission, and fill its destiny ; and that 
struggled and died to make another possible ; and 
thus from surface down to the foundation of the 
world through not only one or two, but in some 
places, a thousand strata. 

Standing there we see that each succeeding form 
of life could live and carry out its work only as 
some preceding life suffered and died for it. The 
law of that cliff is one for another and all for man. 
These dying myriads make the soil of his Eden, 
the cement for his building, the marble for his art. 
You cannot make a grain of your wheat grow un- 
less you plant it in the mouldering remains of some 
life that died to give it growth. Your wheat, your 
barley, your fruit, your flowers, are all planted in 
blood ; they live and grow and are beautiful only 
as they send their roots down and take hold of the 
vicarious suffering of other lives that died that they 
might live. 

Men may object to the doctrine of vicarious suf- 
fering in theology ; in nature it is put beyond 
doubt by that limestone rock. Men may object to 
secure the life of the soul in this way ; it is beyond 
doubt that there is no other way of getting bread 
for the body. 



PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 



The air we breathe, the water we drink, the food 
we eat, the raiment wherewith we are clothed, are 
all fraught with vicarious suffering. Why, then, 
should it be thought a thing incredible with you 
that by the same law, even the blood of another, 
man comes by the bread of life for his soul ? Hence 
as we see them planting in that limestone rock, 
outside of Jerusalem, not a grain of wheat for 
man's physical life, but a cross on which one more 
vicarious death will take place, in the interests of 
his soul, we see that that cross, with the suffer- 
ings and death experienced on it, is not aside 
from God's purpose in nature ; not something 
foisted in upon, but one with all the mysterious 
dealings of God written all through and down into 
the rocks, — -the fitting climax of a process that has 
its beginning in the foundation of the world. 

The first fossil that lies in that first stratum is a 
type of Christ. Every layer that rises above an- 
other is looking for this crowning death that will 
complete the purpose, that will justify and give it 
meaning. 

If man had continued innocent, the sufferings 
and death of these lowly creatures had been 
enough to meet the wants of his innocence ; they 
had made his garden and his home. If man had 
remained holy, that limestone rock about Jerusa- 
lem had never been rent to receive a cross ; but 
man sinned, and "it is not possible that the blood 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 161 

of bulls and goats should take away sins. " Man's 
needs go farther than bread and fruit and flowers 
can supply. Something else, something better is 
necessary ; and that something better comes by the 
same law, by the same path of vicarious suffering, 
even that of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God slain 
from the foundation of the world. 

In placing the cross in that limestone rock, then, 
we see God laying the foundations of the earth, not 
only for man's use and comfort, but also for an al- 
tar on which the great Sacrifice for sin might be of- 
fered. And all the suffering myriads of life would 
surely miss of their full meaning if they only had 
died ; that would leave man only half redeemed. 
It would supply the needs of the body and leave his 
soul to perish. Hence the cross of Christ, rooted 
in that rock of death, is the grand continuation, the 
fitting climax of all the vicarious suffering which 
has gone on from the foundation of the world. 

Infidelity would have to remove the thousand 
strata of that rock before it could undermine the 
cross, or get rid of the doctrine of vicarious sacri- 
fice. For not only on the text, but on every shell 
is written, ' ' The Lamb slain from the foundation of 
the world." 

Shall we go deeper ? Shall it be claimed that 
this is only the surface and not the foundation of 
the world ? Very well, let us go deeper. We soon 
get away from the limestone, but not from the 



162 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

roots of the cross. Shall it be the carboniferous 
rocks that are the foundation of the world ? They 
are old forests and the fossil remains of primitive 
plants that lived and grew and gave up their lives 
to sustain the world of animal life. They lived and 
died to make it possible for others to live. It is 
still the mother-lode of vicarious suffering. We are 
not yet below the roots of the cross. All this power 
that drives the wheels of our industries ; all the 
genial fires that save us from the rigors of win- 
ter, are possible only as these forests lived and died 
for us. 

The same law of vicarious sacrifice goes down 
through all the black coal fields. On some of these 
black rocks we can see the forms of ferns and other 
plants ; but if we looked closer, we could see the 
form of a cross. As they burn in our fires we can see 
strange things in the blaze ; but if we looked closer, 
we could see in every flame the words of our text, 
' ' The Lamb slain from the foundation of the 
world." You would have to go countless feet below 
Calvary, and remove all carboniferous rocks before 
you could undermine the cross or get away from 
the doctrine of the text. 

Deeper yet ? Very well. Down until we strike 
the aqueous rocks, and we are in the presence 
of mountains thunder-riven, broken by frosts, disin- 
tegrated by fierce storms, washed down by floods, 
sorted and re-sorted by seas ; giving their life to 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 163 

make a soil for the following forests. It is the same 
law — one for another. On every bit of sandstone 
we read, ' ' The Lamb slain from the foundation of 
the world." 

Deeper yet until we come to the igneous rocks ? 
Down then, until the pick strikes through into the 
very core of the earth. We see a fierce struggle of 
chemical elements gradually yielding up their heat 
and first fiery life to form the solid crust on which 
all the higher life of earth depends for its continu- 
ance. It is the same law of surrender, of sacrifice. 
All through the heaving mass, lying there at the 
foundation of the world, deeper than the efforts of 
man have yet gone, we see wrapped the roots of 
the cross. In every cooling wrinkle of those ex- 
hausted fires we read, ' ' The Lamb slain from the 
foundation of the world. " The oldest fact in nature 
is that of vicarious suffering. 

II. Let the life and history of man be the 
" world" of the text. The roots of the cross go to 
the foundation of it. 

When God laid the foundation of the material 
world for man, and when man appeared thereon, 
God pronounced it ' ' very good. " If man had re- 
mained innocent, there would have been no more 
suffering or dying ; but man fell and had to win his 
way back through that word " subdue." Through 
measureless struggle and suffering man has subdued 
the earth ; has upreared fabrics of education, of 



164 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

legislation, of religion, and has made not an un- 
comfortable dwelling-place of this rude earth. We 
are here to-day in the enjoyment of law, of liberty, 
and of religion ; but will you tell me which of these 
privileges, so dear to us, so necessary to our well- 
being came by any other path than that of vicarious 
suffering ? Men come to this continent with speed 
and safety only because thousands of sailors have 
struggled with the storms, suffered the privations, 
and died in the abyss of the Atlantic. 

Every ship sails through the blood of men who 
suffered and died for us. Your way to Heaven 
may not lie through vicarious suffering, your way to 
this continent certainly does. And coming to this 
continent, we build our homes and cultivate our 
fields in safety and prosperity ; but before we could 
do that, armies of pioneers had to die of malaria, of 
Indian arrows, and wild beasts. The paths through 
our forests that are steel-laid railroads were first 
marked out by graves. 

We are here in the enjoyment of many privileges 
as citizens. They are possible only because armies 
have marched and counter-marched and made cent- 
uries ring with the blows of many battles. The 
most pathetic sight I ever witnessed was that of 
the veterans of the Grand Army marching past, 
bearing the old battle-flags ; flags torn and tattered 
and riddled with shot ; flags that in their dim colors 
seemed to be still carrying the smoke of battle ; 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 165 

flags that in their stains are still eloquent with the 
sufferings of men that carried them to the front, 
and wrapped them about their bodies in death. 
Our schools, our court-houses, our halls of legisla- 
ture, are possible only because brave men, all 
through the years, were willing to carry such in 
and out of the bloody conflict. Such .is the law of 
our civilization ; such is the price of our freedom. 
All over those flags, as they passed, you could read, 
4 ' I set my face like a flint ; " ' ' His visage was 
marred more than any man ; " " Surely he hath 
borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. " All those 
faces upturned in death on all battle-fields, are gaz- 
ing not on dumb stars in an indifferent heaven, but 
looking and waiting for the coming death on the 
cross to give their 'Suffering and death justification 
and meaning. 

We are here in the enjoyment of religious privi- 
leges, none daring to make us afraid. You are 
under this roof to-day in undisputed religious lib- 
erty, only because back of us there were Christian 
heroes and martyrs willing to resist the power of 
despotism and superstition, and die in the attempt 
to wring our religious liberty from their unwilling 
grasp. I have stood where eighteen thousand lie 
in martyr's graves to make the Presbyterian Church 
what it is. And looking from that place, every hill 
and heatherbell in sight was baptized with the tears 
of women and the blood of men who wept and bled 



16(3 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

for you and for this church. Men may refuse the 
mansions of heaven on the ground of vicarious suf- 
fering ; there is confessedly no other ground on 
which to build the mansions of earth. It lies at 
the foundation of every privilege of life. You can- 
not take up a book to read, nor roll up a ballot to 
vote ; you cannot sit down in a pew in church, nor 
walk the streets of the city or the green fields of 
the country in safety, except some one has gone 
before you to purchase the privilege with his blood. 
Beneath us lies the limestone rock that lived and 
died to make our homes and fields possible ; over- 
lying that rock there is a layer of human life, sac- 
rificed to make our fields free and our homes safe. 
Why, then, should it be a thing incredible with you 
that our souls should rest for their immortal privi- 
leges on the sufferings and death of another ? 
Surely since we can trace in the arrangement of 
dead matter, of organic life, and in all the events 
of the human world one continuous system of 
vicarious suffering, carried on for the well-being of 
others, the cross of Christ, by which our souls are 
saved, is not something foisted in upon the nature 
of things, but something eternally rooted in it, — the 
continuation and fitting climax of all that came be- 
fore. Infidelity would have to remove the crust of 
the earth and quench the interior fires, would then 
have to destroy every record of human history be- 
fore it could undermine the cross, or get beneath 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 167 

its roots ; for on every page of history is written, 
"The Lamb slain from the foundation of the 
world." The innermost fact of history is that of 
vicarious suffering. 

III. Let the religious life of man be the 
' l world " of the text ; let the Bible be the exponent 
of that life. The roots of the cross go to the foun- 
dation of it. 

All this long sweep of history, of poetry, of 
prophecy, of ritual, of sacrifice, is sometimes 
thought to be too large and complicated for our 
religious necessities. There are those who would 
cut it all out except the Sermon on the Mount. 
But just as God has left all the record of early 
storms of fire and rain ; all the successive layers of 
the life that struggled and suffered beneath the 
rocks of Calvary, so has He preserved all the lay- 
ers of moral struggle, all the successive eras of 
revelation and of worship, that we might see them 
finding meaning and fulfillment in the cross. The 
Bible without the cross would be a plant without a 
blossom, a tree without fruit. The cross without 
this Old Testament would be a carnation blossom 
without the plant, or root, or soil that gave it form 
and development. The cross is not something 
different from all the Old Testament, but the con- 
tinuation and climax of it. Isaiah's eloquence is 
awakened only as he anticipates the cross ; David's 
harp sounds its sweetest harmonies only as it is 



168 PA C2FIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

waked by the coming of the cross ; the laws of 
Moses, the ritual, all the incense waved in the 
temple, all the blood sprinkled on the mercy seat, 
all the lambs led to the altar, have meaning only as 
they point to the Lamb of God. All the captivities, 
the sufferings, the wanderings, of the Hebrews, all 
the story of their Joshuas, their Davids, are ans- 
swered only in the coming of the great Deliverer. 
Down through all this Book the cross sends its 
roots until, in the first page of it, at the very 
foundation of this moral world, you find it written, 
' ' The seed of the woman shall bruise thy head, 
and thou shalt bruise his heel. " 

Christ himself settled this question when, on the 
way to Emmaus, he overtook the two disciples 
doubting that the Jesus whom they had known was 
the Redeemer of the world, because He had died 
on the cross. The cross was to them, as to many 
since, a stumbling block. ' ' O fools and slow to 
believe, " said He, ' ' ought not Christ to have suffered 
these things, and to enter into his glory ? And be- 
ginning at Moses and all the prophets he expounded 
unto them in all the Scriptures the things concern- 
ing himself." The Saviour, in His teaching after 
the resurrection, lifted up the layers of the Bible to 
show the disciples that the roots of His cross went 
all the way down to the foundations of it. 

You cannot take the cross out of the Old Testa- 
ment without rending apart every book and every 
page in every book. You cannot take the Old Tes- 



VICARIOUS SUFFERING. 169 

tament from under the cross without cutting away 
its roots and letting it fall a meaningless thing 
among the rubbish of the world. The vicarious 
sacrifice offered on that cross is the climax of the 
whole book. Not only here, but in every part of it 
is written, ' ' The Lamb slain from the foundation of 
the world." The deepest doctrine of the Bible is 
that of vicarious suffering. 

We see then why the cross is the one theme of 
the Christian gospel ; why it is the enthusiasm of 
Paul, the poetry of John. We see why it has been 
the glowing theme of the Christian church, that by 
which it has swayed the thoughts and secured the 
affections of men. We see why it is the one theme 
to which you dedicate this house, and which is to 
fill it from year to year with sacred eloquence. 

I have said these things at length for the consola- 
tion and enthusiasm of you who have fled to this 
truth of the vicarious sufferings of Jesus Christ for 
your own salvation, and have reared this house as a 
guiding light to all in similar peril seeking similar 
safety. I want to feel myself, and to cause you to 
feel that in laying hold of the cross, we have hold 
of that which goes to the foundation of the Bible, 
of history, of nature, and of the eternal purpose of 
God. We need ask no man's pardon for believing 
in vicarious suffering. 

When God plants a cedar tree on the stormy 
brow of Lebanon, He gives it mighty roots (the 
word " cedar" means a root), roots that take hold of 



170 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

the rocks and that penetrate through the crevices 
thereof, widening and pushing the lateral rocks 
aside, seeking as it were to lay their grip around 
the very foundation of the world. You can take 
shelter under it with safety. It will fall only when 
the solid Lebanon is upturned. 

The cross is not two pieces of wood hastily 
knocked together and set up in a hole in the earth 
for a brief and temporary purpose ; it is a tree, it 
is God's rooted cedar. Not till memory of the 
Bible has disappeared from the earth ; the records 
of history reversed ; the strata of the rocks proved 
a lie, and God's eternal purpose found capricious, 
need we fear its fall. The Lamb was slain from 
the foundation of the world. 




REV. W. H. LAN DOS. 



OURSELVES SINNERS. 



BY PROF. WARREN H. LANDON, D. D. , 

Late Pastor Calvary Church, Portland, Ore., and now Professor of Practical The- 
ology in the Theological Seminary, San Anselmo, California. 



But are there not with you, even zuith you, sins against 
the Lord your God ? 2 Chron. 28 : 10. 

Beautiful things are often found in unexpected 
and out of the way places. We ordinarily go to 
the cultivated garden for rare and beautiful flowers ; 
but they are sometimes found by the traveler in 
places that have never before been trodden by the 
foot of man. They have bloomed on, shedding 
their fragrance upon the air, with no one to admire 
them but the God who made them. So in the 
broad field of Bible truth, for the field is so broad 
that it takes man long to traverse it, there are beau- 
tiful things in out of the way places, that are rarely 
or never met with by many Bible readers and stu- 
dents. It will be admitted that what we may term 
precious passages are more numerous in the New 
Testament and in the Psalms than in any other 
portion of the Bible. Probably the great majority 
of sermons is preached from texts selected from the 

[171] 



172 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

New Testament. This is as it should be ; for in 
the Old Testament we have only foreshadowings of 
good things, while in the New we have the good 
things themselves. In the Old Testament Christ is 
promised. In the New, Christ is come. So the 
New Testament furnishes the richest pastures for 
the sheep and lambs of Christ to feed in regularly. 
But into the rougher, rockier, and what some might 
call dryer places of the Old Testament, we should 
come occasionally, for in them we find some pre- 
cious and helpful truths. The books of Chronicles 
may not be on the whole very interesting read- 
ing, but in this passage in which our text is found 
there is a beautiful foreshadowing of gospel truth. 
I confess that though I have read it many times, 
and this text has caught my eye and plunged 
itself into my heart, I have never noticed before 
how this whole account has in it beautiful foreshad- 
owings of some of the teachings of Christ. 

Dr. Thomson, in his work entitled, "The Land 
and the Book," says of the event recorded here, 
"It is one of the most humane and beautiful 
actions to be found in the entire records of ancient 
or modern warfare." It was the time of ruinous 
dissensions between the kingdoms of Israel and 
Judah. Judah had greatly sinned against their 
God, and the time of terrible punishment drew 
nigh. Pekah, the last able or powerful monarch 
of Israel, entered into a confederacy with Rezin, 



OURSELVES SINNERS. 173 

king of Damascus, and invaded Judea. In the bat- 
tle that followed, Judah lost 120,000 men, while 
200,000 men, women, and children were captured 
and carried away. These prisoners were led away 
to Samaria. i\s the armed host with their great 
army of prisoners and great spoil came to Samaria, 
a prophet of the Lord, named Oded, met them and 
said: "Behold, because the Lord God of your 
fathers was wroth with Judah, he hath delivered 
them into your hand, and ye have slain them in a 
rage that reacheth up unto heaven. And now ye 
purpose to keep under the children of Judah and 
Jerusalem for bondmen and bondwomen unto you ; 
but are there not with you, even with you, sins 
against the Lord our God ? " Then certain of the 
noble men, princes of Israel, rose up and said the 
captives should not be brought in. The soldiers 
yielded, and left the captives and the spoil with the 
princes. They took the spoil and with it clothed 
and shod the captives, gave them to eat and to 
drink, set the feeble ones upon asses and returned 
them to Jericho to their brethren. Milman, in his 
history of the Jews, calls this "a beautiful and re- 
freshing incident in this gloomy and savage part of 
the annals of Israel." We may call it an early 
illustration of the gospel precept, ( ' If thine enemy 
hunger, feed him ; if he thirst, give him drink." 

Three needs are suggested by the interrogation of 
the text : 1. The need of self-examination; 2. The 



174 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULP J T. 

need of forgiveness ; 3. The need of charity and a 
forgiving spirit toward others. 

I. The Need of Self-examination. One needs to 
examine himself, or he will surely overlook not 
merely some little blemishes in his own character, 
but some very large sins. It is one of the pecul- 
iarities of our fallen human nature that we can see 
faults in others and be unconscious of greater faults 
in ourselves. In the event recorded in the passage 
before us, it is evident that the children of Judah 
are receiving punishment for their sins. When 
Israel gained this signal victory over Judah, and 
marched off with a great multitude of prisoners and 
a great abundance of spoils, they may have con- 
gratulated themselves on their good fortune, and 
some of them may have said, "The children of 
Judah have received the due reward of their sins ; " 
for they had sinned greatly against God. And yet 
how much better were Israel ? Had they not also 
become an idolatrous nation ? Had they not also 
sinned greatly against the Lord their God ? And 
yet they led away their 200,000 captives to make 
bondmen and bondwomen of them as if they were 
a holier people. But a prophet of the Lord ap- 
peared upon the scene and put the somewhat start- 
ling question, "But are there not with you, even 
with you, sins against the Lord your God ? " 

A prophet of the Lord is often needed with 
trumpet-voice to call the attention of people to 



OURSELVES SINNERS. 175 

their sins. As we read in Isaiah, ' ' Cry aloud, 
spare not ; lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and 
shew my people their transgression, and the house 
of Jacob their sins. " It is such an easy matter to 
be mistaken about one's own sins, or to overlook 
them. One of the most marked illustrations of 
this in the Bible is found in the history of David. 
He had committed a most outrageous sin. And 
yet it had not apparently disturbed him. He did 
not seem conscious of the greatness of his offense 
against both man and God. But the prophet of 
the Lord was on hand. He visited David and told 
him a touching story about a poor man who had 
but one little ewe lamb. It grew up with his chil- 
dren, and ate with them, and was like one of them. 
In the same city was a rich man who had large 
herds and flocks. A traveler came to visit the rich 
man ; and instead of taking one of his own large 
herd, he sent and took the poor man's only lamb 
and had it slain and dressed for the stranger. 
David did not see himself in this parable, did not 
see that it was just what he had been doing in 
causing the death of his brave soldier, Uriah the 
Hittite, that he might have his beautiful wife Bath- 
sheba. He did not think of himself and his own 
meanness. But he grew very angry when he heard 
about this rich man who had taken the poor man's 
lamb. It was an outrage that such a thing should 
occur in his kingdom. The man should restore 



1 7 (3 P- 1 CIFIC CO A S T PUL PIT. 

what he had taken, fourfold, and then should be 
put to death because he had no pity. To his great 
astonishment the prophet pointed his finger at 
him and said, "King David, thou art the man." 
Though his own sin was as a mountain, he could 
not see it until his eyes were thus suddenly opened 
by the touching parable of the prophet. 

Dr. Joseph Parker speaks thus of Peter, when 
Peter was asking Christ how many times he should 
forgive his brother if that brother sinned against 
him : " ' ' How oft shall my brother sin against me 
and I forgive him ? ' ' My brother sin against me ? ' 
Just like us ! It never occurred to Peter that he 
might sin against his brother. Standing there in 
conscious perfectness of character and disposition, 
will and thought, godly man, serene and most pious 
soul, he wonders how often he has to play the great 
man by forgiving somebody else ! He starts from 
a wrong point. The question is not an innocent 
one, it is steeped in guilt if he did but know it ; but 
who ever assumes his own peccability ? who ever 
starts the question from the possibility that he may 
be the offender ? " 

It is therefore so easy, even for one who profes- 
ses to be a godly man, to overlook his own sins, 
that we can easily see the need of self-examination. 
The apostle says, " Examine yourselves^ whether^ 
be in the faith ; prove your own selves." When 
sins are talked of, when sinners are condemned or 



OURSELVES SINNERS. 177 

prayed for, it would be well for us to inquire, ' ' Are 
there not with us, even with us, sins against the 
Lord our God ? " 

II. The Need of Forgiveness. Let this question 
now come home to you. Why not to you ? ' ' Are 
there not with you, even with you, sins against the 
Lord your God ? " Can you not think of sins that 
you have committed ? You can very readily think 
of the other man's sins, the other woman's faults. 
You have talked about them the past week. You 
have read about sins and crimes, and commented 
much upon the condition of society. You have 
read until you have grown heart-sick and wished the 
press would give us fewer columns or fill them with 
more wholesome news. But we are talking about 
you now. Would you murder ? Most assuredly 
not, you answer. But we read in God's word that 
1 ' whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer. " How 
far toward murder would you go in the way of hat- 
ing your neighbor or your brother ? Read through 
the ten commandments. If you have not broken 
every one of them, have you not made some ap- 
proach thereto ? Sober, honest thought will bring 
us all to confess that we have sinned against God 
and in His sight. Now if we are a part of the hu- 
manity of whom it is said, ''All have sinned and 
come short of the glory of God, " what are we going 
to do ? Are we going on to the end of life ' ' com- 
ing short " ? Are we going on into eternity "com- 



178 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

ing short " ? The Scripture plainly declares what 
is the result of unforgiven sin. " The wages of sin 
is death." Therefore if there are with us, even 
with us, sins against the Lord our God, one of our 
greatest needs is that of forgiveness. And there is 
forgiveness with God, ' k forgiveness with thee that 
thou mayest be feared. " "If we confess our sins, He 
is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to 
cleanse us from all unrighteousness. " "If any man 
sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus 
Christ the righteous." Forgiveness is needed, and 
forgiveness is to be had with the blessedness which 
follows. For we read not, Blessed is the man who 
has never sinned ; but, Blessed is the man who, 
having sinned, finds forgiveness, even as the psalm- 
ist says, ' ' Blessed is he whose transgression is for- 
given, whose sin is covered." 

III. The Need of Charity and a Forgiving Spirit. 
We are in no condition to be severe upon others. 
Judah had sinned, but Israel was not enough better 
to glory over them. They too had sinned. "It ill 
becomes sinners to be cruel." Christ says, "Judge 
not that ye be not judged, " or " Condemn not that ye 
be not condemned. " ' ' Why beholdest thou the mote 
that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the 
beam that is in thine own eye ? Or how wilt thou 
say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of 
thine eye ; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye ? 
Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine 



OURSELVES SINNERS. * 179 

own eye ; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast 
out the mote out of thy brother's eye." 

And not only when we think of our own sins and 
weaknesses as compared with those of our fellow- 
beings should we be moved to charity, but even 
more when we think of what a sinless God has 
overlooked and forgiven in us. How much is God 
willing to forgive in us ? 

" Here is a bottle almost full of tears, 
Bundles of heartless prayers and faithless fears. 
Talents grown rusty with long lying by ; 
A half-strung harp whose music is a sigh ; 
Necklaces strung with vows that once were fair, 
But broken now or spent in empty air ; 
Thoughts, feelings, passions, all with evil rife — 
Neglected duties and a wasted life." 

All this can God forgive. All this and much 
more he has forgiven many of us. Then, if we 
would be like God, we must be ready to for- 
give. If the Son of God, who was without sin, 
could be patient with sinners, pray for them, for- 
give them, and restore them when they were peni- 
tent, we who have sinned, who know how easy it is 
to sin, who know how hard it is to live without sin, 
ought to be charitable, patient with the sinful, and 
ready to forgive. As one has said, " Forgiveness 
should be the delight of Christian men." People 
who have been forgiven much ought to be ready to 
forgive much. 



180 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Why is there not more of this forgiving spirit in 
the world — in the Christian world ? The first 
answer would be, because there are such large 
remnants of sin in the Christian world. Another 
answer might be, that some people think they 
belittle themselves when they display a forgiving 
spirit, — lower the tone of their dignity. When one 
comes to another and says, ' ' Forgive me the 
wrong I have done you ; I know the act was a 
mean one ; I know it hurt you ; but it was hasty 
on my part, and I have suffered more for it then 
you have ; I pray for forgiveness," and the other 
turns away and says, ' ' No, I cannot forgive you ; 
I cannot take by the hand again so mean a spirit ; 
cannot associate again with one who could do so 
hasty an act," is it an indication of manliness or 
womanliness or of a great soul ? — Far from it. It 
is a small soul that cannot forgive a penitent one. 
Pope was right when he wrote : — 

"To err is human; to forgive, divine." 

1 ' Great forgiveness means great character and 
resources in the forgiver. " The greatest Being in 
the universe, yea, He who created the universe, 
God himself, forgives. And only when we are God- 
like, manifesting like love and forgiveness, are our 
souls great and noble. 

Wonderful is the forgiveness of God as shown in 
the gospel ! And it is shown to people that are 
very unworthy. The limit of forgiveness by Jewish 



OURSELVES SINNERS. 181 

law was thrice. A most devout Jew after forgiving 
his brother Jew three times was at liberty to be 
very unmerciful if a fourth trespass was committed. 
When Peter came to Christ and asked how many 
times he should forgive his brother if his brother 
sinned against him, he thought he would be gener- 
ous in his question, and so put the number up to 
seven. His heart had grown that much larger by 
associating with Christ. Seven times was a great 
deal better than the three times of the Jew under 
the old Jewish law. But when he said, ' ' Till seven 
times ? " Jesus promptly answered, i ' I say not 
unto thee, Until seven times ; but, Until seventy 
times seven." That is four hundred and ninety 
times. By the time one has forgiven his brother 
four hundred and ninety times, he has so fallen into 
the way of it that he can go on indefinitely. And 
that is just what Christ meant to teach. Forgive 
your fallen, penitent brother without limit. Make 
no account of the number. Keep no books. Then 
He went on to give the tragic parable of the un- 
merciful servant. It is the most tragic of all Christ's 
parables. A certain king had an officer who by 
some means became his debtor to the amount of 
ten thousand talents. Orders were given that he 
and all his family and all he had should be sold that 
payment might be made. He fell upon his knees 
and prayed the king to be patient and he would 
pay him all, — a thing he could not do, for a bank- 



182 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

nipt debtor cannot pay a debt of ten thousand tal- 
ents. The king, knowing it could not be done, and 
seeing the man upon his knees, had compassion 
and forgave him the whole great debt. The for- 
given man went out and soon met a fellow who 
owed him one hundred pence. In a rage he caught 
him by the throat and said, ' ' Pay me that thou 
owest." In precisely the same language that he 
had used a little while before, when kneeling before 
the king, the man said, ' ' Have patience with me 
and I will pay thee all." But in this man's heart 
who had been forgiven so much, there was no for- 
giveness. And so with violent hands he threw the 
debtor into prison. The story got out. The king 
heard of it and was wroth. He recalled this official 
and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should 
pay all that was due him. Then Christ adds, ' ' So 
likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, 
if ye from your Jicarts forgive not every one J lis 
brother their trespasses. " 

We lose the force of this parable if we fail to 
note not only the contrast in the conduct of the 
two men toward their debtors, but also the amount 
of the two debts. How much are ten thousand 
talents? — In our money, about $10,000,000. 
How much are a hundred pence ? — About $17. 50. 
So we see one man who had been freely forgiven a 
debt of $10,000,000 turning about and with an un- 
merciful grasp laying his hands on the throat of a 



OURSELVES SINNERS. 183 

man who owed him $17. 50. Is this an exaggerated 
illustration of truth ? I do not believe that He 
who knew what was in man, would exaggerate. I 
do not believe that we, after careful thought, will 
call it exaggeration. There are similar occurrences 
to-day. There are people who have prayed God 
to forgive them for ten million sins, who turn and 
manifest an unforgiving spirit toward those who 
have offended them once or twice. This ought not 
so to be in a Christian world that has been learning 
of Christ for nearly nineteen centuries. 

We ought not only to reap benefits from the 
compassion of God, but to imitate it. Dr. Mac- 
laren says : ' ' Many real and imperfect Christians 
have got the length of looking to the forgiving love 
of God in Christ as their only hope, but not of 
looking to it as their imperative example. Their 
minds are, like ocean-going steamers, built in 
water-tight compartments, and the gospel which is 
stored in one, has not reached all the rest. There 
is no real forgiveness without previous experience 
of God's. There should be no real experience of 
God's without immediately subsequent imitation of 
it ; but though there should not be, there some- 
times is." 

Let us study the forgiveness of God with a view 
of imitating it. So great is it that it is difficult for 
human language to describe it. Let me again bor- 
row a few words from another : ' ' The Lord is slow 



184 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

to anger, plenteous in forgiveness. He multiplies 
to pardon ; it is not a thin, transparent wave He 
allows to flow over the black stone of my sin, but sea 
upon sea, Atlantic upon Atlantic, He pours upon 
that blackness, letting it be found no more for 
ever. ' Let the wicked forsake his way and the un- 
righteous man his thoughts, and let him return 
unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him, 
and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon,' 
with multiplied forgiveness, wave upon wave, bil- 
low upon billow of forgiving love, and our sin shall 
be as a stone cast into the depths of the, sea." 
Thus God forgives. Therefore ' ' be ye kind one 
to another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, 
even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." 







REV. W. B. NOBLE, D. D. 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST ? 



BY REV. W. B. NOBLE, D. D. , 

Pastor First Presbyterian Church, San Rafael, California; and late Pastor of 
First Presbyterian Church, San Diego, California. 



What think ye of Christ? Matt. 22:42. 

Christ is the central figure of the Bible. Prom- 
ised from the beginning, foretold in prophecy, typi- 
fied in illustrious personages, forshadowed in the 
ritual of the church, longed for by the devout of all 
ages, He was the very substance of the Old Testa- 
ment, the sum of its history and doctrine, the con- 
summation of its hope. 

And still more prominently does He stand forth 
in the New Testament. Its history is the story of 
His life. Its doctrines center in His person and 
work. Everything pertaining to Christian experi- 
ence has its source and supply in Him. Take away 
Christ, and the Bible loses much of its beauty and 
all of its saving power. A distinguished writer has 
shown what beauty and force are possessed by the 
Psalms of David, when read in the light of Bethle- 
hem and Calvary. 1 

1 "Witness of the Psalms to Christ,''' 1 by William Alexander, D. D., 
Bishop of Derry. 

[185] 



186 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

And the same thing might be shown in regard to 
many other books of the Bible. ' ' The testimony 
of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. " ' ' Search the 
Scriptures," said our Lord, "they are they which 
testify of me." 

The question of our text is fundamental. What 
we think of Christ is a matter of the greatest im- 
portance. The enemies of Jesus were asking Him 
questions about matters that lie around the circum- 
ference of religion, — the tribute money, the resur- 
rection, the commandments of the law. But the 
question He asked them struck the very center. As 
the whole world takes the color of the glass through 
which we look, so all our views of duty and piety 
and the way of salvation will be colored by our 
ideas of Christ. 

If we take the Unitarian view, and regard Him 
as a mere man like ourselves, or as a being who, 
however exalted and glorious, is something less 
than divine, then the very foundation of our hope 
will be destroyed. In this view He may indeed be 
a great teacher and a perfect pattern of life ; but 
he cannot be our Saviour. We must have a divine, 
an almighty Saviour, or we have no Saviour at all. 
Wholly without meaning from the Unitarian stand- 
point are those Scriptures which speak of Christ as 
"the propitiation for our sins," of His blood as 
cleansing from all sin, and His grace as sufficient 
for us ; or of His being the bread of life, the light 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 187 

of the world, the resurrection and the life. If 
Christ is not God, then there is no atonement for 
sin, no salvation for sinners. We must either 
abandon all hope of heaven, or else deceive our- 
selves with false notions of God's mercy or our own 
goodness. 

But if, as the great mass of Protestants as well 
as Roman Catholics believe, Christ is God, then 
faith has a worthy object, sin a sufficient atone- 
ment, our weakness an almighty helper, death a 
glorious conqueror. If Christ is God, then He can 
say, ' ' Thy sins be forgiven thee ; " " Come unto me, 
and I will give you rest ; " ' ' He that believeth on 
me hath everlasting life ; " ' ' In my Father's house 
are many mansions, . . . I go to prepare a place 
for you." And we can commit the interests of 
our souls to Him, and hope in Him in life and 
death. 

If Unitarianism is true, how sad a thing it is for 
the race of sinners ! We can only weep with Mary 
at the empty sepulcher of Jesus, and join in her 
sad lament, ''They have taken away my Lord." 
But if, like her, we can look upon the face of the 
risen Christ, and realize with Paul that He is " de- 
clared to be the Son of God with power, ... by 
the resurrection from the dead," then our hearts 
shall be glad and our hopes bright, and we shall 
run with eagerness to tell the tidings of His re- 
deeming grace. 



188 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

That we may learn what we should think of 
Christ let us ask, — 

I. What did the Old Testament writers think of 
Him ? They predicted His coming, and described 
many of the events of His history with circumstan- 
tial detail. They wrote His wonderful biography 
in advance. They foretold the time and place of 
His birth (Dan. 9 : 24, 27 ; Micah 5:2); His line- 
age from David and Judah (Jer. 23:5, 6) ; His 
birth of a virgin (Isa. 7:14); the spotless perfec- 
tion of His character (Isa. 53 19); many of the in- 
cidents of His ministry (Isa. 42 : 1-3 ; 61 : 1-3, 
etc.) ; His entrance into Jerusalem, riding upon an 
ass (Zech. 9:9); His betrayal for thirty pieces of 
silver, and the purchase of the potter's field with 
money (Zech. 11:12, 13) ; the parting of His gar- 
ments by lot (Ps. 22 : 18) ; and with marvelous ac- 
curacy many of the details of His sufferings, death, 
burial, and resurrection. Ps. 22 ; Isa. 53 ; Ps. 
16 : 10, etc.. 

What did these writers think of this personage 
in whom they were so deeply interested ? On this 
point they have not left us in doubt. 

David declares Him to be the Son of God (Ps. 2: 
7), and represents the Father as saying to Him, 
"Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever." Ps. 
45:6. He also describes Him as a sorrowing and 
suffering Man, dying in shame and agony, forsaken 
of God and despised by men. Ps. 22. 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 189 

Isaiah applies to Him divine titles. He is Im- 
manuel, God with us. Isa. 7:14. He is called 
"Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the 
Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. " Isa. 9 : 6. 
At the same time He is " a man of sorrows, and 
acquainted with grief, " and His death is a vicarious 
offering for sins. Isa 53. 

Micah declares His eternal existence : His ' ' go- 
ings forth have been from of old, from everlasting." 
Chap. 5 : 2. 

And Malachi describes Him as the Lord who shall 
suddenly return to His temple, and who shall exe- 
cute the work of judgment. Chap. 3. 

Surely it is clear what was thought of Christ by 
the holy men of God in the olden times, who spake 
as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. 

II. Let us ask what the contemporaries of Christ 
thought of Him — those among whom He walked 
and taught. We cannot, indeed, take their ideas 
as authoritative and final ; still the inquiry is inter- 
esting, and its result may at least give us the di- 
rection in which the truth about Christ lies. We find 
our Lord on one occasion starting this inquiry Him- 
self. "He asked His disciples, saying, Whom do 
men say that I, the Son of man, am ? " Matt. 16 : 
13. And their answer shows that while the people 
did not agree as to who He was, they all regarded 
Him as a very remarkable personage, as the great- 
est and best of men, if not something more than 



190 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

man. "They said, Some say that thou art John 
the Baptist ; some, Elias ; and others, Jeremiah, or 
one of the prophets." Verse 14. 

Says Bruce: "When we reflect on the high 
veneration in which the ancient prophets were 
held, we cannot fail to see that these diverse 
opinions among the Jewish people concerning Jesus 
imply a very high sense of His greatness and ex- 
cellence. Taken separately, they show that in the 
judgment of candid observers Jesus was a man of 
surpassing greatness ; taken together, they show the 
many-sidedness of His character, and its superiority 
to that of any one of the prophets ; for He could 
not have reminded those who witnessed His works 
and heard Him preach, of all the prophets in 
turn, unless He^ had comprehended them all in His 
one person. The very diversity of opinion respect- 
ing Him, therefore, showed that a greater than 
Elias or Jeremiah or Ezekiel or Daniel had ap- 
peared." - 1 

In harmony with this was the uniform opinion of 
the great mass of the Jewish people. While His 
enemies in high places denounced Him as "Sa- 
maritan," "devil," "blasphemer," the multitude 
entertained toward Him feelings of the highest 
respect. They " heard him gladly." They " won- 
dered at the gracious words which proceeded out 
of His mouth." They acknowledged that He 

"Training of the Twelve," p. i66. h 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 191 

''taught them as one having authority." Even 
the officers sent to arrest Him came back saying, 
' ' Never man spake like this man. " And the mul- 
titude generally recognized Him as ' ' the great 
prophet who should come into the world." 

The verdict of His contemporaries has not been 
set aside by the opinion of later times. Even 
those who at the present deny Christ's divinity vie 
with us in rendering homage to the beauty and ex- 
cellence of His character. They hold Him up as 
the one perfect flower from the plant of our hu- 
manity, the one perfect example of purity. They 
declare His teachings to be truth itself. 

Keeping this in mind we may go a step farther 
and ask, — 

III. What did Christ think of Himself? For 
we may press the point that a man so truthful and 
holy as He is universally admitted to have been, 
will not think of Himself more highly than He 
ought to think. Surely He will make no false and 
presumptuous claims. What, then, did He say of 
Himself ? Was He satisfied with the ideas of the 
people as reported to Him by His disciples ? — No. 
As if implying their inadequacy, He presses His in- 
quiries further. ' ' He saith unto them, But whom 
say ye that I am ? And Simon Peter answered and 
said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. " 
Matt. 16:15, 16. We can understand Peter's 
words only as declaring the true deity of Christ. 



192 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

And yet Jesus, instead of rebuking the declaration 
as presumptuous and blasphemous, or modifying it 
as likely to be misunderstood, gave it His hearty 
and unqualified approval. He "answered and 
said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona ; 
for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, 
but my Father which is in heaven." Verse 17. 

In the passage which contains our text, Jesus 
presents the same claim. He asked the Pharisees, 
' ' What think ye of Christ ? whose son is he ? They 
say unto Him, The son of David. He saith unto 
them, How then doth David in spirit call him Lord 
saying, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on 
my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy foot- 
stool ? If David then call him Lord how is he his son ? 
And no man was able to answer him a word. " He 
teaches that He whom they rightly called son of 
David, was also David's Lord, who sitteth at the 
right hand of the Father, and cometh to judge the 
world. 

His more direct claims to deity are abundant. 
He declares Himself "Lord of the Sabbath." (Matt. 
12:8); "the light of the world." (John 8: 12); 
"the bread of life" (John 6: 35); "the true vine," 
giving spiritual life and fruitfulness to his disciples. 
John 15 ; 1-8. He " hath power on earth to for- 
give sins." .Matt. 9:6. He says to Philip, "He 
that hath seen me hath seen the Father, and how 
sayest thou then, Show us the Father ? . . . Be- 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 103 

lieve me that I am in the Father, and the Father in 
me." John 14:9, 11. He says of the man who 
loves Him and keeps His words : ' ' My Father will 
love him, and we will come unto him, and make 
our abode with him." Verse 23. He says, "My 
Father worketh hitherto, and I work" (John 5 : 17), 
making Himself, as even the Jews understood, 
"equal with God." Verse 18. He speaks of the 
glory which He had with the Father before the 
world was. John 17:5. He demands that all men 
honor the Son even as they honor the Father. John 
5:23. He says plainly, "I and my Father are 
one." John 10 : 30. 

Bold, presumptuous, blasphemous declarations 
are these unless He who makes them is truly God. 
We must either admit the true divinity of Jesus 
Christ, or we must cease to regard Him as a holy 
man, and must denounce Him as a deceiver. The 
position of those who deny His divinity, but laud 
Him as a perfect man is utterly illogical. If He 
was a perfect man, holy in life and truthful in word, 
we must believe His testimony concerning Himself. 

IV. What did the apostles think of Christ? We 
might at first sight think that the testimony of the 
apostles can add nothing to that of Christ Himself. 
But if it be true, as we believe, that the apostles 
were inspired to write and speak, then their testi- 
mony is but further testimony of Christ Himself 
speaking through them by His Holy Spirit. And if 
13 



194 PA CIF1C CO A S T PULPIT. 

revelation is progressive, rrray we not expect that 
its tide, instead of falling, shall go on rising even to 
the last, and its voice, instead of dying away, shall 
grow louder and more distinct ? 

There are some doctrines, like the atonement, 
which are clearly understood only in the light of the 
finished work of Christ. The cross on Calvary 
was the full explanation of John the Baptist's 
sermon, "Behold the Lamb of God which tak- 
eth away the sin of the world," and of many say- 
ings of our Lord, which, on their utterance, the 
apostles "understood not." The empty tomb was 
a revelation to them of the person and glory of 
Christ, brighter than any they had ever seen when 
His deity was veiled in human flesh. Ah ! when 
He had suffered, and risen, and entered into glory, 
they knew Him better than they had ever known 
Him before. And when the Spirit had taken of the 
things of Jesus and shown them unto them, they 
could speak of Him with authority. What then 
did they think of Christ ? 

It would be impossible within the limits of a ser- 
mon to give more than a few samples of their 
statements concerning Him. Let these suffice : 
Thomas, hardest of all to convince, confesses Him 
in these words, ' ' My Lord and my God. " John 
20 : 28. Peter proclaims Him as the giver of the 
Holy Ghost. Acts 2:33. The dying Stephen 
(not an apostle, it is true, but the first Christian 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 195 

martyr) commits his soul to Him saying, ' ' Lord 
Jesus, receive my spirit." Acts 7 : 59. James de- 
scribes Him as the "Lord of glory." James 2:1. 
John says of Him, ' ' This is the true God, and 
eternal life." 1 John 5:20. Paul exhorts the 
elders of Ephesus to ' 4 feed the church of God, 
which he hath purchased with his own blood." 
Acts 20 : 28. See also Phil. 2 : 5-1 1. 

Let any one read through a single one of the 
epistles, or the book of Acts, or Revelation, and 
gather its testimony on this subject, and it will be 
strange indeed if he rise not from the reading with 
strengthened faith and more sure and steadfast 
hope in Jesus Christ as the Son of God and the 
Saviour of men. 

V. What has the church throughout its J li story 
thought of Christ t Of course the Scriptures, and 
not the church, are the fountain of authority, the 
only infallible rule of faith and practice. The 
function of the church is not to create truth, but to 
interpret and proclaim the truth of the Scriptures. 

Yet it is interesting and important to know what 
interpretation the church, under the illumination 
of the Holy Spirit, has put upon the teachings of 
Scripture on so important a subject as this. And 
church history shows that from the beginning there 
has been the profoundest interest in the doctrine of 
the person of Christ, and that it has received very 
thorough discussion. 



196 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Now, the difficulty concerning the doctrine, and 
the occasion of discussion, lay not in the facts in- 
volved in it, but in the explanation of the facts and 
the reconciliation of their apparent contradiction. 
It was universally accepted, as the teaching of 
Scripture, that Christ was truly divine, and at the 
same time truly human. But the union of the two 
natures in one person was felt to be, and certainly 
is, a mystery. There were two opposite directions 
which error was likely to take, and did actually 
take, — one the exaltation of the divinity at the 
expense of the humanity of Christ, the other the 
exaltation of His humanity by the denial of His 
divinity. The latter was the error of the Ebionites 
of the ancient church, which has reached its 
extreme in the teachings of Socinians and Unita- 
rians. 

The former, or the denial of His humanity, began 
with a sect who held that matter was inherently 
evil, and hence that Christ could not have a human 
body without being sinful. His life in the rlesh, 
they said, was merely an appearance (Docetic her- 
esy). Another theory (the Apollinarian) gave Him 
only a partial humanity — a human body but not a 
soul, the divinity occupying the place ordinarily oc- 
cupied by the soul in man. 

These errors on the one side and the other were 
promptly rejected by the church (Council of Con- 
stantinople, A. D. 381). Later on came other 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 19? 

speculations running also to opposite extremes, — 
the Nestorians, so strongly emphasizing the sepa- 
rateness of the divine and human natures as to de- 
stroy the unity of the person ; and the Eutychians 
and others so thoroughly fusing them as to destroy 
the distinctive character of both. 
. But, notwithstanding the oscillations of the 
needle, caused by the speculations of a few theo- 
logians in their attempts to explain a profound mys- 
tery, the faith of the church has always settled 
toward, or rather has never really wavered from, 
the true pole. The Council of Chalcedon, held 
A. D. 451, gave formal and elaborate statement to 
the doctrine. And the Chalcedonian Christology, 
as it is called, is the faith of the church, Catholic 
and Protestant, down to the present day. 

Briefly stated, it comprises these five points : 1. 
Christ's true divinity ; 2. His true humanity ; 3. 
The union of two natures in one person without 
mixture ; 4. The unity of the person possessing 
both divine and human attributes ; 5. The divinity 
of the person of Christ. 

In modern times attempts have been made chiefly 
by German theologians, to explain more fully the 
relation of the two natures of Christ to each other, 
especially with reference to the mental growth and 
development of the child Jesus. Taking their name 
from the Greek, and in Phil. 2 : 6, translated "he 
humbled himself," or in the revised version, "he 



198 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

emptied himself," these are called Kenotic theories ; 
their idea being that during the time of His earthly 
career, the Son of God either in whole or in part 
laid aside His divinity, resuming it after His resur- 
rection from the dead. 

But these theories have not met the acceptance 
of the church. It is impossible that God should 
cease to be God, or that He should lay aside any 
of His attributes. What the apostle teaches, in 
the passage referred to, is that the glory of Christ 
was for the time obscured by His dwelling in the 
flesh ; that He laid aside, not His divinity, but the 
manifestation of it. In all his humiliation He was 
the same divine being, walking upon the sea, rais- 
ing the dead Lazarus from the grave, and opening 
the gates of Paradise to a dying thief. 

The doctrine of the^ church from the beginning 
has been the doctrine of the Scriptures, the doc- 
trine of the divine human Christ, son of Mary and 
Son of God. 

Mysterious it is beyond a doubt, but let us not 
stumble at its mystery. ' ' All things go out into 
mystery." A God whom we could fully under- 
stand would be no God, but a being no -greater than 
ourselves. Nay, there is a mystery in our own be- 
ing analogous to this mystery in the person of our 
Lord. Jn every human being there are two nat- 
ures in one person ; the soul, or the spiritual nat- 
ure ; and the body, or the physical nature. Who 



WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 199 

can explain their union ? How can two things so 
different in their nature be joined together in one ? 
If, then, the mystery of our own being baffles 
us, let it not shake our faith that we cannot ex- 
plain the higher mystery of the union of the two 
natures in the person of Christ. Let us rejoice 
that we have a Saviour who is both divine and hu- 
man ; our fellow-man to sympathize with us, our 
God, mighty to save. He who wept human tears 
by the grave of Lazarus, and with divine power 
called the dead man back to life, is our friend and 
brother, our Redeemer and Lord. In Him the 
wants of our souls are fully met. To Him let our 
adoring praise be given now and evermore. 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 



BY THE REV. J. M. PATTERSON. 

Late Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Tacoma, Washington, and now of 
the First Presbyterian Church, Omaha, Nebraska. 



Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure 
and steadfast. Heb. 6 : ig. 

The anchor in olden time was frequently spoken 
of as the sacred anchor. It always stood as the 
emblem of hope. By early Christians it was 
adopted in reference to the stormy ocean of life, 
and sometimes with reference to the persecutions 
of the early church ; hence the anchor is found en- 
graved on rings and monuments and on the walls 
of the cemeteries of the catacombs ; sometimes it 
is found associated with the fish, which was used 
as the symbol of the Saviour, and in this combina- 
tion wrought out the motto, "Sfles in Chris to!" 

It has also been suggested that the fact that the 
transverse bar of an anchor forms a cross, may have 
given rise to the use of the anchor as a Christian 
symbol. 

The anchor is essential to the safety of the 
sailor. He holds many things as absolutely essen- 
[ 200 ] 




REV. J. M. PATTERSOy. 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 201 

tial ; he must have sufficient provision for his voy- 
age ; he must have rope and canvas and chart and 
compass, but nothing is more absolutely essential, 
nothing so indespensable as the anchor. The 
sailor who would go to sea without an anchor would 
be considered worse than a madman ; and when 
the anchor is lost, as it sometimes is in a storm, 
the loss is considered incalculable. It matters not 
how great or how small the ship, how long or how 
short the voyage, how valuable or invaluable the 
cargo, the anchor is nevertheless essential. 

The anchor is needed to fasten the vessel, and 
steady and stay and protect it in the midst of the 
storm ; it is needed to help guide the vessel 
through narrow channels ; it is needed to fasten 
and fix the vessel in the harbor ; it is needed 
chiefly because of the winds and the tides. If the 
water were always calm, and there were no strong 
currents, and if there were always a straight and 
wide and sufficiently deep channel, possibly the 
anchor might be dispensed with ; but under existing 
conditions it is absolutely essential to keep the 
vessel from drifting away and from being broken to 
pieces upon the rocks and reefs. 

In the great voyage of life the soul needs anchors 
just as truly as the ship ; it needs them because 
there are storms of trial and storms of temptation, 
and because there are tides and currents and un- 
dertows in the human heart that tend to drive and 



202 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

drift the heart and life and character away ; if, in 
the journey of life, we should never encounter con- 
trary winds, if there were nothing within human 
nature that was temptable, nothing on which sin and 
Satan and the world and the flesh could secure a 
hold, if there were not two laws in our members, 
one of which consists of an undercurrent of selfish- 
ness and worldliness, then it might be possible for 
the soul to make a safe passage over the ocean of 
life without the help of anchors ; but such is the 
ideal rather than the real humanity. 

In existing circumstances the voyage must be 
stormy, and we must be prepared to battle with 
wind and wave, " and with whirlwind wrestle," or 
be resigned to make shipwreck. When I look into 
your faces, especially the faces of you young people, 
I tremble for your safety. 

Your pulses beat fast, and your blood runs hot ; 
you are just at the time of life when temptation 
has peculiar power over you, and when dissappoint- 
ment and affliction may result in the shipwreck of 
your soul. These trials and temptations and 
storms and undercurrents, if properly met, will be 
overcome. They are God's means of testing us ; 
and it is for us to prepare to show ourselves worthy 
of the love and the confidence and the favor which 
He has manifested toward us. The anchor keeps 
the ship safe in the time of storm. There is no 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 203 

sight more beautiful than that of a great ship rid- 
ing the waves safely in the time of storm. At such 
a time the entire safety of the ship depends upon 
its management — upon keeping her head to the 
sea and to the tempest ; very often life and death 
hang for hours in the balance, it being uncertain 
whether the ship can hold her head to the storm, 
until the tempest has passed. A single wave strik- 
ing her broadside would shatter her hull ; her only 
safety is in facing the storm ; and for this there is no 
means equal to the anchor, for no sooner does the 
anchor bite the ground, than the vessel that has 
been drifting to the waves broadside, turns a sharp 
prow to them and cleaves them in two, and allows 
them to pass harmlessly by. Those in charge of 
the ship watch for the veering of the wind, and in- 
stantly turn the vessel to meet it, so that neither 
wind nor wave can strike her on the broadside. 
As it is with ships, so it is with souls ; we need an 
anchor to help us to face bravely and successfully 
the waves of trouble and temptation, (See " Par- 
able of the Anchor," Foster's Ency. , p. 6480.) 

And then, the anchor keeps the vessel when in 
the harbor from drifting with the tides and currents, 
and so the anchor of the soul is needed to keep the 
soul from drifting away ; and after all, this is one 
of the greatest needs of the soul's anchor. It is 
marvelous how easily the human heart drifts away. 



204 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Paul, in his letter to the Romans says : ' ' Therefore 
we ought to give the more earnest heed to the 
things that were heard, lest haply we drift away 
from them." It is against this tendency to drift 
that you and I need to guard most assiduously. 

As you will naturally infer from these suggestions, 
the character of the anchor is a matter of supreme 
importance. In olden times the anchor consisted 
simply of a huge stone, with a rope attached thereto, 
or a basket of stones, or a sack of sand, or a log of 
wood loaded with lead. Such were the anchors 
used by the ancient Greeks. These anchors, of 
course, simply operated by the law of inertia, and 
held the boats by friction along the bottom of the 
stream. Later, iron was used as the material out 
of which the anchor was constructed, and the 
greater improvement of forming them with flukes, 
or teeth, by which they fasten themselves to the 
bottom of the stream. The invention of teeth is as- 
cribed by some to the Tuscans, and by others to 
Midas, king of Phrygia ; but whether invented by 
one or the other of these, it has been a perpetual 
blessing to the world. 

The modern anchor follows, in the main, this in- 
vention, only the ancient anchor was less reliable 
because the work of the smith was less perfect. 
To-day, these anchors are made by the use of steam 
hammers and furnaces and fan blasts, in place of 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 205 

the old-fashioned bellows ; and the increased knowl- 
edge of the art of forging has rendered the modern 
anchor almost infinitely superior to that of the an- 
cients ; indeed, so perfect is the art that we rarely 
hear of a broken anchor. 

There are some anchors for the soul which have 
been tested and proven trustworthy, and these I 
commend to you. I speak of anchors, rather than 
a single anchor. The iron-clad vessels, as a rule, 
carry eight anchors — two Kedge anchors, two 
Bower anchors, one Stern anchor, one Stream, and 
two Sheet anchors. There are anchors for the soul 
which fulfill for the soul the functions of these dif- 
ferent anchors for the ship. 

Kedge anchors are used to guide the ships along 
a narrow channel. The anchor is carried out in a 
small boat and dropped, and the ship can then be 
hauled to the anchor, and thus brought back into a 
channel sufficiently deep for its passage. These are 
anchors, in the use of which the utmost patience is 
required, and so I suggest that you possess yourself 
of the Kedge anchor of Patience to carry you 
through the narrows and shallow channels of life. 
You have need of patience in the voyage of life ; 
unless you are the happy possessor of this anchor, 
you are in great danger of making shipwreck. It 
is an old saying, ' ' He that will have a cake out 
of the wheat must needs tarry the grinding ! " It 



206 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

is equally true in the great interests of life ; he that 
would reach a safe harbor must needs tarry, or have 
patience in the voyage. 

The poet declares that purity is power. If so, 
patience is very close akin to purity, for Browning 
has truly said : "I worked with patience, which is 
almost power ! " And Douglas Jerrold was not far 
from right when he said — 

" Patience is a virtue ; catch it if you can ! 
'Tis seldom found in a woman, never in a man." 

' * It is the strongest of strong drinks, for it kills 
the giant Despair." It is this that makes us ''bear 
the ills we have, rather than fly to those we know not 
of ! " Many a soul has made shipwreck from lack of 
patience. They may have, like Paul, recovered 
from the wreck, but it is nevertheless a shipwreck. 
Among these, stands out prominently in the history 
of the Bible, Abraham and Rebecca. 

Unto Ahraham God had made wondrous promises: 
All the land that he could see on the North and 
South and East and West, God had promised to 
give to him and to his seed after him ; and He had 
also promised to make Abraham's seed as the dust 
of the earth. After this promise, time rolled on ; 
year after year gave place to its successor ; Sara's 
beauty of feature and of form was gradually effaced; 
old age had stolen upon them, and yet there was 
no indication of the fulfillment of the promise, for 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 207 

Abraham was still childless. He grew impatient. 
He should have believed, as we all recognize, that 
with God all things were possible, and that even of 
the stones God was able to raise up children to 
Abraham; but he was willing to follow Sara's sug- 
gestion, and formed that unhallowed relation with 
an Egyptian. He did this to bring about the ful- 
fillment of the promise of God ; he was impatient, 
and in this respect made shipwreck. 

It was not otherwise with Rebecca and Esau. 
To Rebecca God had made the promise that from 
her twin sons there should rise two nations, and 
that the elder should serve the younger. Jacob 
was her favorite, but Esau was the inheritor of the 
birthright. Nevertheless, God's promise that Esau 
should serve Jacob, which involved the transfer of 
the birthright from Esau to Jacob, remained con- 
stantly in Rebecca's mind. She became impatient 
for the fulfillment of this, and in her heart desired 
to hasten the providence, so, putting Esau's clothes 
upon Jacob's back, and putting a lie into his mouth, 
she sent him into his father's presence to receive 
Esau's blessing. 

You remember how patience preserved David 
from an awful shipwreck. David was called from 
the sheepfold to become the successor of Saul ; Saul 
soon became envious and jealous of the shepherd 
boy ; and David became a fugitive for his life. Yet, 
you will remember, he patiently waited for God to 



208 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

put him in possession of the kingdom. At least 
thrice Saul's life was in David's hand ; a single ar- 
row sped from David's bow at two different times 
would have put him in immediate possession of the 
crown, but David restrained himself ; he possessed 
his soul in patience, and thus avoided staining his 
hands with the blood of Saul, and also incurring 
the displeasure of God by undue interference with 
His providence. 

In passing along the channel of life, you will fre- 
quently find yourself run aground or run ashore. 
The channel is narrow and it is shallow, and you 
will not be able to make the progress that your 
soul intensely desires. The desired haven seems 
still a long way off, and you advance so slowly ! 
There is here great temptation to a spirit of impa- 
tience. You need to carry out the Kedge anchor 
and draw your vessel over into the channel before 
you can pursue your voyage ; and so I beg of you, 
provide yourself with this kedge anchor of pa- 
tience; it will prove of infinite value to you in the 
voyage of life. 

The larger vessels also carry what they call the 
stream anchor. This is for use in a river or shal- 
low place where a small anchor is sufficient to hold 
the ship. There is a stream anchor of the soul which 
I desire exceedingly to commend to you for your 
possession. I refer to the anchor of the love of 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 209 

home and love of kindred. Many of you young peo- 
ple before me to-night are so far from your homes, 
that you may be considered to be far out on the 
voyage of life — a long, long way from home. Most 
of you, I assume, have had Christian homes, homes 
that have been mellowed and brightened and 
sweetened and perfumed by the grace of Christ, 
homes in which the Spirit of Jesus has reigned su- 
preme, homes that were made delightful by sweet 
fellowship and by the tender ministries of love on the 
part of father and mother, brothers and sisters. 

But there comes a time in the history of almost 
every life for the leaving of home, and that is a time 
fraught with infinite dangers. It is a momentous 
hour when the young man or the young woman turns 
the back upon home, and faces a cold, heartless 
world. Cowper put it right when he said : — 

" My boy, the unwelcome hour is come, 
And thou, transplanted from thy home, 
Must find the colder soil, the bleaker air, 
And trust for safety to a stranger's care ! " 

And yet, even to this poetic thought I would sug- 
gest a modification. Let the boy away from home 
trust for safety, not so much to a ' stranger's care ' as 
to the care of a home enjoyed in reflection and lived 
over again in meditation. Let it be a fixed principle 
with you that the memory of home shall never die ; 
14 



210 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

that your soul shall remain linked to the souls of 
your old home by golden chains of love, chains that 
no wear and tear of time can destroy. 

You will be infinitely better for such an anchor. 
Some one has said : "I am the better for thinking 
of the trees that grow and the flowers that bloom 
about my childhood home ; " and Woodworth ex- 
presses the same thought when he sings : — 

" How dear to my heart are the scenes of my childhood, 
When fond recollection presents them to view. 
The orchard, the meadow, the deep, tangled wildwood, 
And every loved spot which my infancy knew ! " 

A fond mother who was bidding adieu to her son 
about to take his leave, gave him this parting in- 
junction : "My son, remember that there is good 
blood in your veins ! " I do not me.an to intimate 
that it will be of any help to you in the world in 
the great conflict of life, to pride yourself upon your 
pedigree ; I believe that blood tells in man as in 
beasts, but I believe it is possible for every one of 
you, by the grace of God, to enrich your own 
blood. If you have not good blood in your veins, 
you can make the blood good that is already there ; 
but it will be a great help for you to remember with 
constant love and sympathy and fondest gratitude, 
the associations and experiences of home. This 
love for home is one of the strongest anchors hold- 
ing us to the path of rectitude and virtue. Burns 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 211 

recognized the power of affection for home, and 
closed that matchless picture of the home life in 
' ' Cotter's Saturday Night " with these words : — 

"From scenes like these, old Scotia's grandeur springs, 
That makes her loved at home, revered abroad." 

Napoleon captured at one time an English sailor 
who was trying to escape across the Channel in a 
small skiff which he had constructed from bits of 
wood and bark. When brought before the great 
warrior he was asked if he really meant to risk his 
life in crossing the Channel in such a crazy con- 
trivance ? ' ' Yes, Sire, and if you will let me, I am 
willing to try it yet ! " Napoleon replied : ' ' You 
must have a sweetheart whom you are anxious to 
revisit." " No, I only wish to see my mother, who 
is old and infirm. " ' ' And you shall see her, " was 
Napoleon's reply, ' ' and take her this money from 
me ; for she must be a good mother to have such 
an ambitious son." Such a love of mother and af- 
fection for home will protect any one in crossing the 
great channel of life, even though sailing in a shaky 
craft, and over stormy seas. So I beg of you, take 
the stream anchor of love of home with you, and 
keep it strengthened by close and constant com- 
munion with those you have left behind, and it 
will be a really wonderful shield and protection to 
you in all the journey of life. 



212 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Bower Anchors. — Ships carry two Bower anchors, 
and these are for ordinary use, so I beg to com- 
mend to you the two bower anchors of Hope and 
Righteousness. Without these you cannot get on 
well in the voyage of life. ' ' Which hope ye have 
as an anchor to the soul both sure and steadfast ! " 
I doubt if any man who has lost hope ever makes 
a successful voyage in life. 

" Hope springs eternal in the human breast ! " 

In the battle, hope is half the victory ; the army 
that goes forth to conflict with a spirit of despair, 
only proves to be a true prophet ; their defeat is 
almost certain. David met Goliath not so much 
with the sling and the pebbles gathered from the 
brook as with the heart of hope. Campbell has 
truly said : — 

"Auspicious hope, in thy sweet garden grow 
Wreathes for each toil, a charm for every woe ! " 

Hope sets her bow in the stormiest cloud, kin- 
dles her star in the darkest night, furnishes a balm 
for every wound and a joy for every sorrow. Hope 
is the good Samaritan that finds us on the Jericho 
road, and ministers to us in our misfortune. 
Longfellow has truly said: "The setting of a 
great hope is like the setting of the sun, — the 
brightness of our life is gone ! " And Milton has 
inspired many a heart with his song in "Paradise 
Lost," when he says: — 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 213 

" What reinforcement we may gain from hope ! 
If not, what resolution from despair ! " 

It is hope that extracts joy from sorrow, and 
organizes victory out of defeat, because, as Shelly 
says, ' ' Hope creates from its own lack the thing 
it contemplates." The truth is, every undertaking 
in life is inspired by hope. It was under the 
banner of hope that Noah set out to build the 
ark ; that Abraham went forth to a country that he 
knew not ; that David went forth to slay Goliath ; 
that Paul, in the midst of his shipwreck, cheered 
the disheartened crew, and cast the four anchors 
out at the stern. 

It is under the inspiration of hope that the 
farmer goes forth in the spring-time and prepares 
the soil for the seed ; that the merchant stores his 
shelves with goods ; that the professional man goes 
forth to his office ; that the house-wife goes about 
her daily toil ; that the children take up their steps 
joyfully to the schoolhouse ; that the statesman 
evolves great schemes for the benefit of his con- 
stituents ; that the warrior goes forth to battle ; and 
that every enterprise is undertaken and successfully 
consummated. 

Truly, without hope there is no endeavor ; the 
man whose heart is possessed of despair hides him- 
self in the cave of Adullam, or in the shade of the 
juniper tree, and asks God to let him die ; and why 
should not we have on board the anchor of hope ? 



214 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

The true doctrine is : While there is a God, there is 
hope ; and David has given us the philosophy of 
life in his dealing with his soul, when he said : 
' ' Why art thou cast down, O my soul ? . . . Hope 
thou in God ; for I shall yet praise him, who is the 
health of my countenance, and my God." 

The bower anchor of righteousness is of equal 
importance ; a good conscience is absolutely essen- 
tial to strength. ' ' My strength is as the strength 
of ten, because my heart is pure !" "Conscience 
makes cowards of us all ! " and well might the 
great master poet have added, ' ' Conscience makes 
heroes of us all." The man with a good conscience 
has nothing to fear. The reason that Felix trem- 
bled before the preaching of St. Paul, was because 
Paul reasoned with him of righteousness and tem- 
perance and judgment to come ; and this sort of 
reasoning aroused his evil conscience, and Felix 
tremble. Think of it ! a mighty ruler, endowed 
with full power of life and death, trembling before 
the address of a prisoner in chains ! Paul was 
strong and courageous because he had a conscience 
void of offense, but Felix trembled because he had 
an outraged conscience. 

I have suggested that one of our greatest dangers 
was from drifting. This is true. We drift into 
the current of worldliness, into the current of self- 
ishness, into the current of false practices, into the 
current of sensuality ; and as we drift into these 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 215 

currents, we drift away from the place of prayer, 
and the commands of God, and go off into the 
places of danger. It is useless for us to attempt to 
excuse ourselves or to justify ourselves in the prac- 
tices that are not strictly in accordance with the 
law of God. I believe it is possible for every soul 
to keep itself pure and true and loyal to God even 
in this world of wickedness and temptation. In 
other words, I believe it is possible to keep our- 
selves unspotted from the world. If God so pro- 
vides that the bird can immerse itself in the water 
and come forth without a drop of water clinging to 
it ; that the worm may crawl through the filth and 
the mire without retaining any of that filth or mire ; 
if he enables the lily, pure and white, to grow in 
the bogs and marshes and yet retain its purity and 
whiteness ; I believe that He will also provide the 
human soul with the means of preserving itself 
from corruption and unrighteousness. In other 
words, I believe it is possible by the grace of God 
to keep the conscience void of offense toward God 
and toward men ; and the nearer we succeed in 
this, the safer will be our voyage and the more joy- 
ous ; and so I commend to you the bower anchors 
of Righteousness and Hope. 

Sheet Anchors. — These are large anchors that are 
stowed away in the waist of the ship, and are used 
only in cases of emergency, or in the event of any 
accident befalling the bower anchor. So God has 



216 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

provided for the soul the sheet anchor which we 
call faith. It is this anchor, you remember, that 
Luther was accustomed to let down in case of great 
emergency ; he let it down by the cable of that 
46th Psalm : ' ' God is our refuge and strength, a 
very present help in trouble. Therefore will not 
we fear, though the earth be removed, and though 
the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea." 

It is this anchor that Job resorted to in the time 
of his great emergency ; his camels were gone ; 
and his sheep and his cattle and his servants also, 
and his horses and even his children and he himself 
were sore afflicted, yet what did he do ? Satan said 
that he would defy God, but in spite of that, Job 
let down the sheet anchor of faith. It is this 
anchor that saved the three holy children that were 
threatened with the fiery furnace in the event of 
their refusing to worship the heathen gods ; it was 
this anchor that protected Daniel, when, in defiance 
of the king's evil covenant and threatenings, he 
prayed with his windows open toward Jerusalem, 
and went down into the lion's den and came out 
unharmed. It was this anchor that protected Paul 
when his friends tried to dissuade him from going 
to Jerusalem lest bodily harm should befall him, 
and he declared that he trusted only in God, and 
that in the path of duty he need have no fear. 

In short, this is the victory that overcometh the 
world, even our faith ; and if we are the happy pos- 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 



sessors of all these other anchors, yet have not this 
sheet anchor of faith in God, which trusts Him in 
the darkest hour, not only when the wind is con- 
trary, but when all things seem to be against us, 
we shall certainly sometime make shipwreck. 

The apostle declares that faith is the evidence of 
things not seen ; and so, the vessel that quietly, 
and seemingly without effort, rides the waves in the 
midst of the storm, and is not carried away thereby, 
but remains still in its place, is evidence of an 
anchor that is not seen, that reaches down through 
the waves by its cable, and fastens itself by its 
flukes upon the rocks or the earth, and fastens 
itself more securely because of the wind and the 
wave. 

So with the soul. In the midst of the trials and 
afflictions of life, there is an evidence of the exist- 
ence and operation of this sheet anchor of faith 
which reaches not down, but up to the very skies, 
and takes hold upon the very heart of God himself. 

In addition to all these anchors, there is the 
mooring anchor and the stern anchor. The moor- 
ing anchor is the anchor that is permanent in the 
harbor, and the stern anchor is used when it is 
required to moor at both head and stern, where 
there is not room for the ship to swing with the 
tide. The stern anchor that I would commend to 
you is the anchor of gratitude, — to love God be- 
cause he has first loved you, — and the mooring 



218 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

anchor is the Cross of Jesus Christ. He stands 
ready and waiting — a stationary anchor in the 
harbor for you to tie yourself to. Tie yourself to 
this anchor by the confession of your faith in Jesus 
Christ. As well might the sailor be ashamed of 
his anchor as for you to be ashamed of your love 
to Jesus Christ. 

It is claimed that a good anchor after being de- 
flected one half second will return to its original 
shape, leaving no permanent set. And so, I beg 
to commend to you as the sum of all this thought, 
the anchor of the religion of Jesus Christ ; it has 
been thoroughly tested ; it has been weighed in 
the balance and has not been found wanting ; it 
has protected many a life ship through the severest 
storms, and it will protect you. There are those 
who will tell you, ' ' Get something modern ; " but I 
tell you no sailor will reject his anchor because it 
is old-fashioned. The anchor used to-day is ex- 
ceedingly old-fashioned, very like those used by 
the ancient Phoenicians, long before the coming of 
Christ into the world. 

Do you think the sailor would adopt some other 
anchor simply because he ought to be progressive ? 
and that he ought not to use instruments that were 
invented thousands of years ago ? Do you think the 
sailor would reject the old-fashioned anchor simply 
because there have been great improvements made 
in the building of ships ? The fact is, this old- 



THE ANCHORS OF THE SOUL. 219 

fashioned anchor has been thoroughly tested and 
thoroughly tried ; and with the sailor the adoption 
of an anchor is not a matter of experiment, but a 
matter of life and death ; and before he will adopt 
a new anchor, it must be proved to him that it is 
better. 

I beg of you, decline to adopt any new religion 
or source of help and protection in life unless it 
has been proven to be better than the old-fash- 
ioned religion of Christ. What does it matter 
how old an anchor is, so it holds in the time of 
storm and need ? And what matters it how old 
the religion of Christ, so that it will make drunk- 
ards sober, and thieves honest, and sinners saints ? 

Cast the anchor of faith, then, into Christ. The 
best place for casting an anchor, we are told, is in 
from ten to twenty fathoms of water, where the 
ground is not rocky or loose sand. It will not do 
to anchor in floating seaweed, or floating logs ; it 
will not do for you to cast anchor in the sand of 
your self-righteousness, or the floating rubbish of 
your own morality. Cast your anchor into the 
substantial and abiding Christ. 



LOVE'S BITTER CUP. 

A sermon preached before sacrament, January 29, 1893. 



BY REV. JAMES CUMING SMITH, 
Pastor Trinity Church, San Francisco, California. 



O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. 
Matt. 26 :jg. 

Jesus had instituted the sacrament, and fortified 
Himself for the supreme trial by fortifying the dis- 
ciples for their responsibilities. He drew His best 
strength from strengthening others. 

The sermon in the upper chamber suggests the 
Sermon on the Mount, though rather by contrast. 
The one was uttered at the inauguration of His 
ministry, the other at its expiration. The one was 
addressed to mixed multitudes on whom He had 
compassion, the other to His chosen and confiden- 
tial circle with whom He held fellowship. The one 
was complete morality, the other was deep and, to 
many, mystical spirituality. The one emphasized 
the legal relations of man with God, of man with 
man ; the other disclosed these strange and sub- 
marine connections of man with God as Saviour, 
[220 J 




REV. JAMES CUMM1NG SMITH. 



LOVE'S BITTER CUP. 221 

as sympathizer. No one can analyze the two 
without a conviction of the divine development of 
Jesus during the interval. Those three years of 
sad experience had been quietly sculpturing a 
nature capable of rapid and profound progress. 

The dusk had drawn its vague shadows over the 
world. The soul of Jesus grew lonelier as the hour 
of destiny drew on. He left the city, with its crowd 
of foreigners and streets of buzzing groups. He 
felt lonelier in the crowd than in the dreariest wilds 
of nature. He was defeating the Prince of evil, 
and on this event hung the fate of men. At that 
hour and that time alone the church was militant 
in the true sense. Since that epochal strife, 
the church has been not so much contesting as 
conquering, and the millennium is a foregone 
conclusion. 

Gethsemane was the severest temptation of our 
Lord's career. Up to that hour He had been 
''straightened till it should be accomplished." 
But in that dark interlude of inaction when all 
the thrill of public wrath or public opposition was 
withdrawn ; in that perilous lull between stormy 
and exhilarating anxieties, when thoughts crowd in 
to break the will and exaggerate (if possible) the re- 
sponsibility, — in that experience, He appeared to 
vacillate for the moment. Gethsemane involved 
the reconsideration and a momentary recantation of 
a lifelong ambition. 



222 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

The defenders of the full deity of Jesus have 
staggered at the commencement of His ministry 
when He was exposed to temptation. How could 
He be tempted, if more than man ? We reply 
that Scripture is leonine ; it speaks with a grand 
negligence of consequences, because it speaks the 
bold, broad fact which must bend all metaphysics 
to it. Scripture affirms the God-head of Jesus, 
and also the peerless manhood. His human nat- 
ure was the theater of all the passions and ambi- 
tions which, because unregulated, jangle and jostle 
one another in the fallen human heart. He was 
assailable, but he was sin-proof, not alone because 
He was divine, but because He was perfectly and 
architecturally human. A full-formed manhood is 
in its very nature, resistant to sin. As you grow 
up toward completeness of character, you acquire 
contempt for what swindles dwarfs. 

In this sense Jesus was tempted in the wilderness, 
but He was more thoroughly tempted in this crisis of 
haunting suspense. Every inducement was held 
out to Him to relinquish the enterprise just at its 
consummation. The temptation drove Him to the 
verge of surrender. "If it be possible, let this 
cup pass." Did it not denote a weakness some- 
where to ask release from an engagement so tran- 
scendent ? to shrink from the last climax of sacrifice 
which would seal the purpose of incarnation ? This 
depends upon what you think He shrank from. 



LOVE'S BITTER CUP. 223 

Weakness it would have been, if you think it was 
the physical phase of the ordeal which unmanned 
Him ; for there have been martyrdoms to rival 
Calvary in point of physical torture. 

We read of the uncompromising fidelity of early 
saints ; we read how men and women stood at the 
gory arenas of Rome with thousands in the sur- 
rounding galleries hungering for the spectacle of 
death struggles ; how a divine calm settled on their 
uplifted features as if they were superior to their 
tragedy ; how they were never so serene as when 
the onrush of hungry beasts extorted a yell of 
frenzy from excited spectators ; and when their 
heroism mounted to a noble stoicism to physical 
pain, it would cast a taint on Jesus to suppose that 
it was chiefly the physical endurance of Calvary 
which shook His fortitude. 

Nor was it the ordeal of facing brutal mobs. I 
admit the horror of a crowd infuriated with passion. 
The crowd swept with rage, crying, ' ' Give us Barab- 
bas! Give us Barabbas!" — the crowd hounding 
Him on, in their inveterate hatred, to His execu- 
tion, — no force of nature can approach its horror. 
The demonism of a wild mass of men is the closest 
approach to hell. For the time being, the multi- 
tude led by its demagogues, and delirious with its 
own vindictiveness, must be in a measure acquitted 
of criminality. « ' Father, forgive them, for they 
know not what they do." 



224 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

We blame the leaders who saw the proof of His 
divinity, repeated and above-board, without being 
convinced. We blame the thousands who had re- 
ceived grace and healing from His ministry, and at 
this hour kept silent lest they should be impli- 
cated in His alleged blasphemies. We blame the 
disciples whose faith may have suffered sore eclipse 
as their Master was leveled to a felon, and who 
undoubtedly shuddered before an enraged city. 

We are not here to condemn their cowardice as 
if it were at all exceptional. We blame the deep- 
seated treachery our general nature is capable of, 
and which a crisis only exposes. But on the other 
hand, we see the divine in the one brave soul in 
all that storm. Jesus alone was mob-proof. They 
could in the garden capture Him ; but only after 
having cowed the band to the ground, He volun- 
tarily surrendered Himself. They could hoot and 
jeer in open court at His withering replies or more 
withering silences ; but all the same they could not 
break that iron will or extort one quick-tempered 
word. They could compel Him to carry His own 
cross, but His was the mien of one who permitted 
their coercion for purposes beyond their under- 
standing. He moved with a regal, unruffled self- 
command because of a telescopic imagination which 
saw the far-off. 

The priests were for the moment. His achieve- 
ment was to dominate the ages and determine 



LOVE'S BITTER CUP. 225 

eternities. The fact that Jesus was a mere victim, 
has been overdrawn, just as the meekness of His 
life has been construed into passivity. He never 
conquered so much as when He seemed conquered ; 
He never rose in such masterful superiority over the 
people as when He was seemingly their victim ; only 
physically and by His own permission was He a 
lamb among wolves ; really He was a lion among 
them. It was a contest above and beyond all this 
which wrung from the overborne nature of Jesus the 
cry, "If it be possible, let this cup pass. " It was 
a contest whose lower side we call Calvary, but 
whose upper side loses itself in the upland of 
mystery. 

When a younger man, I was bound to know the 
reason of everything, but I have grown beyond that 
stage. The best things of earth, while facts that 
govern every life, have a background of mystery into 
which we can pioneer but a little distance. The 
secret and sea-depth of Calvary are utterly beyond 
the explanation of man. The first word of the 
prayer, "Father," is the closest solution at our 
command. Between the Father and the Son there 
had been, from forever, the fellowship of absolute 
love. They had come down from the hoarest 
eternity like two ships on the open shining sea ; 
but a vast curdling cloud closes over the two mighty 
ships, so that for the first time on that long, sunlit 
voyage they seem separated. Never had their rela- 

15 



226 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

tion appeared strained till that hour. Never till 
then had the Son felt the lurid wrath of the 
Father. Never till then had He been overfraught 
with the responsibility of a humanity to be re- 
deemed. And somewhere up around those heights 
was the storm center, just as the Alpine villager can 
look up to the mountain cliffs where the hurricane 
is tossing the snows like spray, but the villager sees 
only the outer edges ; the awful struggle of ava- 
lanche and cyclone, the whirlwinds of wintry wrath 
— these are far beyond and far back from his gaze. 

It is significant that the disciple. of deepest in- 
sight omits Gethsemane. 

We see the mingling manhood and Godhood of 
Jesus. "Father, if it be possible, let this cup 
pass," was the outcry of a shrinking, shuddering 
human heart. ' ' Nevertheless, not my will, but 
thine be done," unveils His divinity. 

We see that Gethsemane finds its duplicates in 
every life consecrated to duty whose two qualities 
are difficulty and solitude. An obligation to be 
such taxes your will, crushes and crucifies your 
ambitions, your bigotries, your jealousies, your 
cowardices, and consequently the enforced solitari- 
ness of principle. You unbosom to few or none 
the thorny disciplines of duty. You feel ashamed 
of some reluctances because they unscreen inher- 
ent weaknesses ; or you feel that in your deepest 
crisis God alone can sympathize. 



LOVE'S BITTER CUP. 227 

Gethsemane was a greater Calvary and involved 
an element unique and unapproachable Besides 
difficulty and solitude which characterize all hero- 
ism, it stands forth for atonement. The polar 
principle of our religion is the unqualified deity of 
Jesus. The coronal feature of His mission was 
the sacrifice which satisfied the justice of heaven 
in some manner, partly and only partly explicable. 
You can find rest of soul and anchorage to faith 
even though you cannot fathom the mysteries of 
that superhuman conflict. So long as the fact is 
yours, you must worship it all the more because 
of its impenetrable background. Reverence im- 
plies a measure of agnosticism. Faith is truth 
we know, shading into truth we know darkly. I 
think more of these revelations because I cannot 
bind and blend them into a clear-cut system. 

As I see the boulders rugged and separate along 
the canyon, I care little whether human masonry 
can harmonize them with one another. I only know 
that they fit into the mountain cliff whence they 
fell. Reverence for dogmas is impossible when you 
unshroud them of their mystery. Your sacrament 
ought to be the more restful and joyous, because 
while clear enough to grasp as a fact, the sacrifice 
of Jesus has underlying principles that defy your 
comprehension. 

It was not a mere martyrdom ; for a martyr 
influences others, but cannot redeem others. A 



228 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

Ridley, a Savonarola, a Paul, were martyrs whose 
names are a legacy of power because they stood 
sternly to truth. They might have recanted and 
the world would have lost but so much influence. 
But let Jesus veto his own laws ; let Jesus retract 
His Sermon on the Mount ; let Jesus deny or even 
disguise His Deity ; and history is foredoomed, the 
emancipation of unnumbered millions is frustrated. 
He was a representative of heaven on earth, but 
He was also a representative of earth before heaven. 
If He wins, all win ; if He fails, all fail. 

Atonement is martyrdom, and vastly more. It 
scathes sin, but shields the repentant sinner. Atone- 
ment is a judicial achievement which penetrates 
the foundations of all government. Atonement 
appeals to a holy and righteous God in champion- 
ship of a race which sinned. Atonement may ex- 
tend to millions never of earth, who have fallen 
from God, just as a canon fired off on one mountain 
sends its reverberations from point to point, along 
a whole mountain range ; nor can any trace its 
farthest echoes. We glory in our atonement all the 
more because we cannot follow its remotest influ- 
ences, nor fathom its philosophy. Enough for us to 
know that with a growing sense of guilt we look 
to Christ who died to set us right with God. 



0$& 




REV. J. B.. STEWART, !>■ D. 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 



BY REV. JOHN B. STEWART, D. D., 

Pasadena, California. 



For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom 
knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preach- 
ing to save them that believe. I Cor. i : 21. 

In most of the ancient faiths it pleased the gods 
to destroy. They were vengeful, sullen, and inac- 
cessible. It remained for Christianity to bring 
God and man within speaking distance. Fate had 
usurped the place of faith, and law excluded love. 
It is the great achievement of the gospel that 
1 * they who were afar off are brought nigh. " But 
even in the sanctified heart a remnant of the old 
heathenism remains. Hence the first duty implied 
in the text is — 

/. To seek a knowledge of God through Christian 
eyes rather than heathen. 

In our efforts to know more of God, it is encour- 
aging to be told that God desires to be known. 
Most men believe that it is God's nature to conceal 
and not to reveal. But light, not darkness, is the 

[229] 



230 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

''habitation of his throne." Light is the rule, 
darkness the exception. Satan, not God, is the 
1 ' Prince of darkness. " What men regard as the 
divine reticence is often but another name for our 
ignorance. It is man that inhabits darkness — 
God dwells in light. Inaccessible, indeed, but 
only as the sun is inaccessible, while self-extend- 
ing and self-imparting. 

It is not God's nature to retire within Himself. 
He has no desire to shut out His intelligent creat- 
ures. He takes no enjoyment in the solitude of 
His own immensity. "He rejoices in the habit- 
able parts of the earth, and his delights are with 
the sons of men." It is only because darkness and 
negation are eternal necessities that they exist. 
They come largely of matter being finite and space 
infinite, at least this is true where no immediately 
benevolent end is to be conserved. 

The telescope reveals sixty-four thousand suns 
within a space no larger than can be covered by a 
half dollar held up at arm's length. Think of it ! 
Sixty-four thousand suns, each like our own, the 
center of a system ! Who will say that God does 
not take kindly to light and revelation ? He is not 
a solitary God, He is a social God. He is a 
fatherly God, and with reverence be it said, a 
brotherly God. He never did anything more like 
Himself than when ' ' he became man " — our 
Brother — and "dwelt among us that we might 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 231 

behold his glory," and at the same time enjoy His 
sympathy. 

The obstacle lies not in the Creator's unwilling- 
ness to communicate, but in the creature's unwill- 
ingness or inability to receive the communication. 
Just so it is with nature. She is always ready to 
give up her profoundest secrets, and to make them 
the property of the human race the moment that 
even one man can be found capable of receiving the 
revelation. 

God is not driving men back from the throne, 
like earthly potentates. He is not walling them 
out, lest peradventure they become too familiar. 
It is to-day a thousand times more difficult to ob- 
tain an audience with the czar of Russia than with 
the Creator and supreme Ruler of the universe. 
God can afford to be on terms of intimacy with 
His subjects. His throne needs no fictitious arti- 
fices for its support. It is established. Thus we 
see that the divine mind is on the side of light and 
revelation, limited mainly by man's capacity and 
willingness to receive. 

This being so, the world's actual theology is 
measured not so much by God, the object, as by 
man, the subject. What the man is, his theology 
will be. Its growth will be in the ratio of the 
man's piety and intelligence. Thus it is in nature. 
The same facts are in the heavens, — the same 
planets, and the same stars, — the same revelation ; 



232 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

but all men do not have the same ability to under- 
stand the revelation ; there is a subjective difficulty 
in man's stupidity. The same stars that burned 
in space and fixed the gaze of Galileo now look 
down upon the poor, ignorant wretches that swarm 
in the streets of Rome and Naples. But what did 
the stars say to Galileo or what to Copernicus, and 
what do they say to the lazzaroni ? 

Or, what is more to the purpose, what did they 
say to the wisest of the ancients who were ques- 
tioning nature in regard to the great mysteries of 
the " unseen and eternal " ? What said the stars? 
Did they reveal the comforting fact that in the 
midst of all this iron-clad penalty which nature is 
exacting all around us, the heart of God is going 
out in loving sympathy toward His sinning and suf- 
fering children ? 

How God may dispose of the ancient heathen, 
or the modern, we know not. Let dogmatism 
answer the question. We only know that it 
will be by another law than that to which the 
enlightened men of a Christian congregation stand 
responsible. 

For the ancient heathen world — the subject of 
the Apostle's declaration — nature had no theory 
of divine government above naked, absolute, un- 
conditional retribution. Nature was the only re- 
vealer, and nature knew nothing but law. Law 
moreover was inexorable. Penalty was supreme. 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 233 

Thrust your hand into the fire, and you will be 
burned, and it serves you right. Fire would not 
be fire if it did not burn. Water would not be 
water if it did not drown. 

Interrogated upon the great question of the ages, 
— "How can a man be just with God" ? — nature 
had no answer which could bring comfort or 
strength to the fainting heart. " I hear no pray- 
ers, " she said, "I grant no pardons," "I take no 
bribes," "I know no repentance," "I listen to no 
explanations, and accept no apologies." That is 
what nature said to Socrates, to Epictetus, to Mar- 
cus Aurelius, and to all the world that ' ' by wisdom 
knew not God" — that only — a clear case beyond 
question. 

Two thousand years ago — we are reminded. 
Very true. The world is growing older and wiser, 
let us hope. And what if nature should now be 
found to be more communicative ! Reason has 
been doing wonders. She has been making mar- 
velous discoveries. Well, the first duty of reason 
is to be reasonable, and the first duty of a man 
who appeals to reason is to hear what reason has to 
say. Appealing to reason, to reason he must go ; 
and reason admits that there are some things which 
reason cannot do. This is all that the text affirms. 
There is no disarrangement of reason. In her 
proper sphere reason is as legitimate as Faith, and 
in obtaining a saving knowledge of God both are 



234 PA CIFIC CO A S T PULPIT. 

necessary. The visible declares the invisible. 
Hence, — 

II. Between true faith and right reason there 
can be no conflict. 

The mistake of reason is in undertaking to per- 
form the office of faith, and faith makes a similar 
mistake when she takes the place of reason. The 
two great heresies are faith without reason, and 
reason without faith. Neither is Christianity. 
" Faith is the gift of God," and so is reason. They 
are children of the same Father, though not neces- 
sarily co-ordinate. With this fact before us, we 
have the same right to insist upon a reasonable 
reason that we have to demand an intelligent faith. 
We have also the right to insist that the two shall 
go together. 

Reason without faith is like skepticism. Faith 
without reason is fanaticism. And here lies the 
two-fold danger of the church. Her Scylla and 
Charybdis are rationalism on the one hand and 
superstition on the other. Let her keep an eye 
toward either shore and in mid-stream hold her 
way onward. While faith is exalted, reason must 
not be ignored nor ostracized. In His public min- 
istry, Jesus always honored the fact that right 
reason is not the enemy of religion. In fact His 
system is founded more largely than many suppose 
upon the testimony of the senses in the exercise of 
right reason. Hence the miracles, hence the 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 235 

whole range of the ' ' Evidences of Christianity " as 
we have them to-day. They date back to some- 
thing that men saw, or heard, or felt, and con- 
cerning which they reasoned, made inferences, and 
drew conclusions as we do to-day. It is not a sin 
to reason, nor yet to accept the testimony of the 
senses. ''Blessed are they that have seen," 
though still more blessed are ' ' they that have not 
seen and yet have believed." 

Ours is a reasonable religion, and they are not 
its friends who represent it as avoiding the light 
which reason has to give. Paul was a simple- 
hearted Christian. He had the faith of a little 
child ; it was his polar star. But Paul was also a 
Christian philosopher. He grappled with the pro- 
foundest problems that ever honored the human 
intellect. He wrote the Epistle to the Romans. 

Jesus never laid an injunction upon thought. 
He had nothing to say about the lower or the 
' ' higher criticism ; " but He did say, ' ' Search the 
Scriptures ; " and with those to whom He spake, it 
meant the closest and most critical examination of 
which honest scholarship was capable. It meant, 
' ' Get down the old manuscripts, the Hebrew 
Bible, the original text ; and if your own Scriptures 
do not testify of me, then do not believe me/ 
Reason has its place. Learning has its place. 

There is no priest-craft in Christianity, no dark- 
lantern affair, no concealments, no wedge of gold 



236 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

nor goodly Babylonish garment in the tent of 
Christianity, that she should avoid a search-war- 
rant. Our religion, if it is the godliest, is also the 
manliest that ever offered itself for human accept- 
ance. ''In secret have I done . nothing," said its 
great Founder ; "I have done all things openly. " 
It is a questioning religion meeting a questioning 
age and a questioning humanity. And standing as 
we do in the presence of Him who says, ' ' Come 
and let us reason together," we fondly indulge the 
hope, that the time is not far distant when, in the 
church at least, the old philosopher's dream will be 
realized, and men will no longer be either killed 
or persecuted for asking questions. 

And yet the present is a time when men do well 
to find the Fountain of light and authority. We 
have had reason ; the world had it. Reason had a 
grand opportunity and a fair trial, but she failed ; 
still was it true that ' ' the world by wisdom knew 
not God ? " What next ? 

III. The church offers herself. — When "the 
world by wisdom knew not God," it pleased God to 
give the church, we are told — the visible church 
being meant — an advance upon heathenism, but 
one in which loyalty to church takes the place of 
loyalty to Christ. In the text the church is sug- 
gested by the omission — conspicuous by its ab- 
sence. Why, must be puzzling to an ultra-church- 
man. Why should the church be passed over in 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 237 

seeking for the great Revealer ? It starts the ques- 
tion, What is the visible church which men declare 
a ' ' fountain of authority " ? There is doubtless an 
invisible church catholic somewhere in the minds 
and hearts of men ; and if this could be heard from, 
the vox ecclesiae might perhaps be accepted with a 
show of reason as the vox dei. 

But the voices we do hear are from the visible 
church. Multiform in its constitution and contra- 
dictory in its utterances ; organized by divine 
authority in its fundamental concept, an ' ' earthly 
house of God ; " but too often in ' ' strife and vain 
glorying " for the gratification of unholy ambitions, 
and always by good men and bad men from good 
motives and bad motives. The visible church 
would seem to be but a poor fountain of authority. 

Thus we are forced back to God. God is the 
only fountain ; all else are but media — channels 
through which God may communicate to give 
Himself out to the children of men. Reason has 
her place, the church has her place ; but of the one 
it is not said that "it pleased God to save" them 
that know, nor of the other, that it ' ' pleased God 
to save " them that obey. Instead we have the 
declaration that ' ' it pleased God to save them 
that believe," faith including both knowledge and 
obedience. Thus, for the knowledge of God, and 
the salvation of the soul, we are called upon to 
emphasize — 



238 PA CIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

IV. The supremacy of faith coming ordinarily 
through the written Word. — Ordinarily — for true, 
saving faith came to Abel and others before there 
was a written Word. Supreme — that is to say, 
supreme in Faith's own domain, as Reason is su- 
preme in Reason's own domain. They are friendly 
monarchs of two friendly empires. Faith honors 
Reason so long as she minds her own business, 
and does not meddle with that which does not 
belong to her. 

But to see God and to know Him is pre-emi- 
nently the office of faith. We are surprised that 
this cognitive, or knowing, quality of faith is not 
more insisted upon ; for the knowledge that faith 
gives is saving, and can be obtained in no other 
way. The knowing is as important as the trust- 
ing. To know God is to love Him, and to love 
Him is to trust Him. The sequence is inevitable, 
and the result is salvation ; hence the phrase 
' ' saving knowledge " is more than cant. It means 
to know God in the loveliness and the lovingness of 
His character, as faith alone can reveal Him. As 
between reason and faith it is a question, not of 
exclusion, but of supremacy. 

The thing affirmed of Reason is that she cannot 
know God. And of Faith that she sees God. She 
4 'endures as seeing Him who is invisible." The 
visible is quite enough for Reason. Let her man- 
age testimony, she will have her hands full if she 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 239 

does that. She can even go a little farther, and 
"feel after God," and finally confess "the un- 
known God. " But to the questions, Who ? What ? 
Whence ? or Where ? she has no answer. She 
knows mathematics, and that is something to boast 
of ; but Faith knows God. The one is natural, 
the other is supernatural. Not that faith is utterly 
divorced from the natural ; for it is not. My faith 
sees London though I never was in London ; and 
that far the natural takes hold upon the invisible. 
Even in this the eye of faith can see farther than 
the eye of sense. 

More is needed however. London is natural, 
and beyond London and all the material universe 
there is a vast domain of the supernatural begin- 
ning with God. Shall this be ignored ? Are God 
and soul and immortality to be passed by ? Is the 
sin problem to be counted of little or no conse- 
quence ? Are we to have no light shed upon this 
mighty mystery of life and destiny ? Are we to be 
left to grope our way down to the tomb asking 
questions and receiving no answers ? Or is there 
a sense, a faculty, an endowment, a revelation, a 
voice, or anything that can enable us to penetrate 
this great wall of thick darkness ? 

Faith, you say. Faith in the world by wisdom 
believed in immortality. What ? In immortality ? 
Socrates believed in immortality. Faith in the 
supernatural ? Socrates believed in the supernat- 



240 PA C1FIC CO A S T PUL PIT. 

ural. Faith in divine revelation ? Socrates be- 
lieved in divine revelation. 

But belief in a quality is not belief in a person. 
Reason had not reached in any true sense the con- 
cept of divine personality ; and to have predicated 
Fatherhood and Brotherhood of divinity would 
have been blasphemy. The personal Christ was 
wanting, — the divine Brother, "the express image 
of the Father," the visible manifestation of the in- 
visible God. 

A radical change was at hand. Reason had 
failed after a fair trial. The great Athenian had 
been four hundred years in his grave. The mighty 
Plato, his great expositor, had risen, and still the 
inspired testimony must be borne, ' ' The world by 
wisdom knew not God." Reason must now give 
way to faith — the portico to the pulpit, wisdom to 
weakness, the philosophers to the fishermen. 
Proud Greek ! To give it all up and join the 
' ' Salvation Army ! " Let us pity him. 

The word ' ' foolishness " lets in a flood of light 
upon the subject. It points to the preaching of the 
cross which was " foolishness to the Greek." Thus 
interpreted, preaching stands for faith. "Faith 
cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of 
God." True preaching is God speaking to the soul 
through the written Word. God is the preacher. 
He may employ an ambassador, or He may not ; 
but the end is salvation through knowledge of Him- 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 241 

self in the person of His Son. Faith cometh by 
preaching, a pure heart by faith, and a pure heart 
sees God. That is the divine concatenation. And 
this is the fact to be emphasized, — not the clear 
head, but the pure heart sees God, and the pure 
heart comes by faith. 

Faith is the seeing, as well as the trusting quality 
of the soul. It has an intelligence peculiarly its 
own, which acts in the spiritual world analogous to 
instinct in the natural world. It reaches its con- 
clusion by a bee-line, while reason struggles, fal- 
ters, and fails. Faith is intelligent, it understands. 
' 1 By faith we understand that the worlds were 
made by the word of God," — " understand " is the 
proper word. 

John Ruskin, in speaking of Judas, says that he 
did not understand Christ — could not make out 
the worth or the meaning of Him. Of course he 
could not. Christ is ' ' spiritually discerned, " and 
Judas had no eye for the spiritual ; he was blind 
on that side of his nature. He knew Christ as a 
man who worked miracles and who could probably 
be trusted to work yet another, and thus free Him- 
self from the hands of His enemies. Christ would 
escape, and Judas would have the ' ' thirty pieces of 
silver." He had a keen eye to business, was evi- 
dently a sharp, wide-awake business man, and was 
no doubt elected treasurer on the strength of his 
business ability. Ruskin says, ' ' He was a muddle- 
16 



242 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

headed fellow, with just brains enough to make 
money." But we may spare the epithet. There 
are some things — and great things too — ' ' which 
are hidden from the wise and prudent and revealed 
unto babes." Christ's divinity and even the perfec- 
tion of His humanity were too deep for Judas. He 
could not see them nor understand them, but it was 
not because he was muddle-headed. It was not 
more brains, but a pure heart that he needed, to 
see God, or even to see a good man. 

A bad man never sees a good man, much less 
can he see God. For the function he must have 
the faculty. That faculty is faith ; and when all 
other sources of knowledge have failed, faith comes 
to the front. Moses' rod swallows up all the other 
rods. There is a point up to which it may be 
safely recorded, ' ' The magicians of Egypt also 
with their enchantments did likewise ; " but sooner 
or later we reach a point beyond which ■ ' the 
magicians of Egypt" cannot go. 

Take Pardon of Sin. Let Reason undertake the 
solving of this great problem. Nature is Reason's 
Bible ; to her Bible must Reason turn for light. 
She must be consistent ; she must say to Nature, 
1 ' To whom shall we go ? Thou hast the words of 
eternal life." And to Reason we say, "Handle 
your Bible reverently. It is a great book. We 
love to read it. It has marvelous revelations. If 
you will not have our Bible, take your own, and 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 243 

make the best of it. Nature, like God, is on the 
side of light and revelation. She is not averse to 
giving up her secrets. If she has pardon for sin, 
she will say so. She is honest and truthful. 
Ask her if she knows of any way by which ' ' a man 
can be just with God. " 

We have tried to read this book of Nature with 
thoughtfulness and fairness. We find sin enough 
— sin everywhere — but no pardon. The fact is, 
nature is but another name for law, and law knows 
no pardon. Pardon is not of the essence of law. 
If mercy come, it must be from somewhere outside 
of law. 

What does Nature say to the man who sins 
against her and against his own body by a reckless 
course of dissipation ? What does she say when 
the man's vital powers are hopelessly impaired, his 
blood poisoned, his lungs decayed, his heart crip- 
pled, and the whole economy of digestion and 
assimilation so fearfully enfeebled as no longer to 
be able to support the wasted tissues or to meet 
the daily demand ? What does Nature say to the 
poor wretch as he lies bemoaning his folly, and 
vowing a hundred times over' that if ever he shall 
rise from that bed of pain, he will lead a new life, 
and be a better man ? Does she say to this sinner, 
begging and pleading for mere}', ' ' Look unto me 
and be ye saved," or " Come let us reason together ; 
though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as 



244 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

white as snow, though they be red like crimson 
they shall be as wool " ? Does she say, ' ' I will 
forget the past," "I will remember thine iniquities 
no more against thee," " I will give thee new lungs, 
a new liver, a new heart, new nerves, pure blood, 
and a healthy brain" ? Not so does Nature meet 
the man who has cast off her authority or tram- 
pled upon her laws. She stands before him the 
impersonation of an insulted avenger. 

She says, "I have warned you by my servants, 
rising up early. I have plead with you to regard 
your own interests, and when you have disregarded 
and violated the laws of your physical being, I 
have still brought you health and healing. But 
now your day of grace is over. No repentance will 
now be accepted, no promises of amendment. 
You have despised my goodness ; now lie there 
and take what you deserve." That is what Nature 
says to those who sin against her. 

True, nature makes an effort at healing within 
certain limits, but the healing is never final — no 
immortal healing. It is only temporary, a stay of 
execution, for there comes a time when nature can 
do no more, death — the inevitable — supervenes, 
and for death nature has no antidote. No help 
here ; none from nature ; none from reason ; none 
from law, — law but no love ; penalty but no par- 
don ; sin but no Saviour ; hunger but no food ; 
thirst but no water. Oh ! it is pitiful to see the 



THE FOOLISHNESS OF PREACHING. 245 

millions of our poor, famishing humanity l ' coming 
hither to draw" and turning away with empty 
pitchers from these dry wells, so utterly unsatisfied ! 

But a voice comes in the midst of it all, ' ' Ho, 
every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters ; " 
' ■ Whosoever shall drink of the water that / shall 
give him shall never thirst ; " ' ' If any man thirst, 
let him come unto me and drink." 

Yes, there is ' ' one way given under heaven 
whereby men can be saved ; " and one way is 
enough if it be God's way. But it is faith or noth- 
ing. Law saves no sinners — she saves the inno- 
cent. Law says, ' ' You have sinned, and you must 
die." Faith says, "You may live. It is at your 
own option; choose it, and you have it." Reason 
puts you in league with nature's power, which ends 
in death. Faith calls in God's power, which is life. 
Reason is for wise people, but faith serves the 
ignorant as well as the wise. We hail a plan of 
salvation that gives ignorance a chance. Thank 
God for a gospel that can find its way outside of 
Boston, and breathe other air than that of the 
university! — a gospel that is not afraid of the 
"Cowgate," and can keep its bearings in the old 
11 Five Points," a Jerry Mc Cauley gospel, that bids 
the wretched victim of rum, poverty, and squalor 
look up to the heavens, and remember that they 
are men and women, and that for them Christ 
died. 



246 PACIFIC COAST PULPIT. 

And then the hard places of life common to us 
all — we all meet there ; and whence the strength 
to help us over ? There is the point where God 
makes foolish the wisdom of this world. ' ' Where 
is the wise, then ? " " Where the disputer ? " The 
strong man, strong of nerve, mighty of brain, here 
trembles "like a reed shaken of the wind." He is 
dealing with God. He is weak, but he lays hold 
upon God's right arm, and now he is strong. The 
sublimest thing in all this world is a humble, suffer- 
ing, trusting human soul. It is the seed-thought of 
that marvelous poem — the book of Job. Grander 
than Homer, but never so grand as when in the 
midst of it all, there is given to suffering a voice, 
and to sorrow a song — the sacred drama — the 
4 ' Divine Tragedy " of the far-away land of Uz, 
"Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him," — 
simple, childlike trust in God ! 

Faith we call it ; well, faith let it be — leaning 
on Him — leaning hard. He has spanned the 
chasm, bridged it with mercy — chasm deep and 
dark, bridge narrow, fragile ; it seems trembling 
beneath your feet ; but no matter, it is God's 
bridge, trust it. Love built it, love measured its 
strength, and love can never deceive you. 

It is an old story. Chalmers told it first, others 
have told it since, for well does it bear the telling. 
Afoot the great Scotchman, as was so often his 
wont, had found his way to the humble abode of 



THE FOOLISIIXESS OF PR EACH IX G. 247 

poverty. Across the burn was the peasant's lonely 
home. It was late in the evening, and growing 
dark. The "wee bit ingle" shed an uncertain 
light upon the water, through the open door. The 
plank was weak, he "kenned," for one so burly. 
The good man drew back, but kindly eyes were 
watching, and in clear broad Scotch there came 
the assuring words, " Lippen to it Doctor." " Aye, 
lippen, that is the word, woman ; it means to trust, 
to give your full weight to it, I will lippen to it." 

And when in after days a poor old Scotch soul 
was struggling in the dark valley for a firmer foot- 
hold, the same good Doctor stood at the bedside, 
helping the weak ' ' old body " to find the way. Of 
faith he spake, but ill was he understood. He tried 
this and he tried that, but with small success. It 
was then that with a flash came the incident now 
years agone. "Just lippen to Him." "Aye, lippen, 
is that what you mean, Doctor ? Yes, I can do that, 
I can lippen to Him ! " 

We must all come to this at last. Peasant or 
philosopher, it is all the same. ' ' Except ye be 
converted and become as little children, ye shall 
in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven." 



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ous life we can recommend nothing better.- -Standard. 

I9TH THOUSAND, 

^he Shepherd JJsctlm. Meditations on the 2 3 d Psalm, cioth, 32 

e^*~) " 7n(f., 5OC. 

We have never read anything so charming on the Twenty-third 
Psalm. It is full of beauty and poetry. Anything that this gifted and 
spiritual author writes requires no recommendation, as he is well known to 
the Christian public. — Irish Congregational Magazine. 

Mr. Meyer has given us a devotional work on this inspired Psalm 
which every Christian man and woman should not only read but carry about 
in his pocket in order to snatch even amid the busy employment of life an 
uplifting and elevating thought. This little book is worth its weight in 
gold. — Central Baptist. 

Envelope Series of Booklets, by Rev. F. B. Meyer. 

The Chambers of the King. Words of Help for Christian The Lost Chord Found. 
With Christ in Separation. Girls. Why Sign the Pledge ? 

Seven Rules for Dai y Living, The Filling of the Holy Spirit. The Secret of Power. 
The Secret of Victory over Sin. The Stewardship of Money. Our Bible Reading. 
The First Step into the Blessed Where am I Wrong? The Secret of Guidance. 

Life. Young Man, Don't Drift! Peace, Perfect Peace. 

30C. per dozen, or $1.50 per 100. 
CHOICE EXTRACTS from writings of F. B. Meyer, 48 pages, 5c. per copy; 35c. dozen. 

newyork. :: Fleming H. Revell Co. :: Chicago. 



Important Missionary Publications. 



AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHN G. PATON. Missionary to the 
New Hebrides. Introductory note by Arthur T. Pierson, D.D. 
2 vols., 12mo., portrait and map, in neat box, $2.00 net. 

One of the most remarkable biographies of modern times. 

"I have just laid down the most robust and the most fascinating piece of auto- 
biography that I have met with in many a day It is the story of the 

wonderful work wrought by John Q. Paton, the famous missionary to the New 
Hebrides; he was made of the same stuff with Livingstone."— T. L. Cuyler. 

"It stands with such books as those Dr. Livingstone gave the world, and 
shows to men that the heroes of the cross are not merely to be sought in past 
ages," — Christian Intelligencer. 

THE LIFE OF JOHN KENNETH MACKENZIE. Medical 
Missionary to China ; with the story of the First Chinese Hospital 
by Mrs. Bryson, author of "Child Life in Chinese Homes," etc. 
12mo., cloth, 400 pages, price $1.50 with portrait in photogravure. 

"The story of a singularly beautiful life, sympathetically and ably written. 
. . . . A really helpful, elevating book."— London Missionary Chronicle. 

"The volume records much that is fresh and interesting bearing on Chinese 
customs and manners as seen and vividly described by a missionary who had 
ample opportunities of studying them under most varied circumstances and 
conditions."— Scotsman. 

THE GREATEST WORK IN THE WORLD. The Evangeliza- 
tion of all Peoples in the Present Century. By Rev. Arthur T. 
Pierson, D.D. 12mo., leatherette, gilt top. 35c. 
The subject itself is an inspiration, but this latest production of Dr. Pierson 

thrills with the life which the Master Himself has imparted to it. It will be a 

welcome addition to Missionary literature. 

THE CRISIS OF MISSIONS. By Rev. Arthur T. Pierson, D.D. 
Cloth, $1.25 ; paper, 35c. 
" We do not hesitate to say that this book is the most purposeful, earnest and 
intelligent review of the mission work and field which has ever been given to the 
Church." — Christian Statesman. 

MEDICAL MISSIONS. Their Place and Power. By John Lowe, 
F. 11. C- S. E., Secretary of the Edinburgh Medical Mission Society. 
12mo., 308 pages, cloth, $1.50. 
"This book contains an exhaustive account of the benefits that may, and in 

point of fact do, accrue from the use of the medical art as a Christian agency. Mr. 

Lowe is eminently qualified to instruct us in this matter, having himself been so 

long engaged in the same field."— From Introduction by Sir William Muir. 

ONCE HINDU: NOW CHRISTIAN. The early life of Baba 
Padmanji. Translated from the Marathi. Edited by J. Murray Mit- 
chell, M. A , LLD. 12mo., 155 pases, with appendix. Cloth, 75c. 
" A more instructive or more interesting narrative of a human soul, once held 

firmly in the grip of oriental superstition, idolatry and caste, gradually emerging 

into the light, liberty and peace of a regenerate child of God, does not often come 

to hand."— Missionary Herald. 

AN INTENSE LIFE. By George F. Herrick. A sketch of the life 
and work of Rev. Andrew T. Prattt, M.D., Missionary of the A. B. 
C. F. M., in Turkey, 1852-1872. 16rao., cloth, 50c 



new york. : : Fleming H-jieoell Company : : Chicago. 



Important Missionary Publications 

(Continued.) 



EVERY-DAY LIFE IN SOUTH INDIA, or, the Story of Coopoo- 
svvamev. An Autobiography. With fine engravings by E. Whym- 
per. i2mo., cloth, $1 00. 

THE CHILDREN OF INDIA. Written for children by one of 
their friends. Illustrations and map. Small 4to , cloth, $1.25. 

"These are good books for the Sunday-School Library, and will help young 
people in missionary societies who desire to have an intelligent idea of the people 
in India whom they are sending their money and their missionaries to convert." — 
Missionary Herald. 

HINDUISM, PAST AND PRESENT. With an account of recent 
Hindu reformers, and a brief comparison between Hinduism and 
Christianity. By J. Murray Mitchell, M.A., LLD. 12mo., cloth, 
$1.60. 

" A praiseworthy attempt to present a popular view of a vast and important 
ubject." — Saturday Review. 

GOSPEL ETHNOLOGY. With illustrations. By S. R. Paterson, 
F. G. S. 12mo, cloth., $1.00. 

11 The first attempt to treat this subject from a thorough-g'ung scientific stand- 
point. A very powerful argument for the truth of Christianity. ''—English Church- 
man. 

"A book to refer to for information not easily to be obtained otherwise. — 
Church Missionary Intelligencer. 

NATIVE LIFE IN SOUTH INDIA. Being sketches of the social 

and religious characteristics of the Hindus. By the Rev. Henry 

Rice. With many illustrations from native sketches. 12mo., cloth 

boards, $1.00. 

" Those who have heard Mr. Rice's missionary addressed Will be prepared to 

hear that this is a fascinating book." — Life and Work. 

CHRISTIAN PROGRESS IN CHINA. Gleanings <iom the writ- 
ings and speaches of many workers. By Arnold Foster, B.A., 
London Missionary, Hankow. With map of China. 12mo., cloth, 
$1.00. 

AMONG THE MONGOLS. By Rev. James Gilmour, M.A., London 
Mission, Peking. Numerous engravings from photographs and 
native sketches. 12mo., gilt edges, cloth, $1.00. 
"The newness and value of the book consists solely in i's Defoe quality, that 

when you have read it you know, and will never forget, all Mr. Gilmour knows 

and tells of how Mongols live." — Spectator. 

EVERY-DAY LIFE IN CHINA, or, Scenes alon? River aud Road 
in the Celestial Empire. By Edwin J. Dukes. Illustrations from 
the author's sketches. 12mo., with embellished cover, $2.00. 
That China is a mysterious problem to all who interest themselves in its w^aira 

ia the only excuse for offering another book on the subject. 



new york. :; Fleming H. Resell Company = : chica«o. 



Send for a li*t c/ contents of entire series. 



A LIBRARY OK CRITICAL, LBARNING 




LIUIN& PAPERS 

ON PRESENT DAY THEMES. 

A SCRIES OFTEN VOLUMES COVERING A WIDE RANGE OF SUBJECTS O* 
CHRISTIAN EVIDENCE, DOCTRINE AND MORALS. 

We wish to place this set of books in the library of every thoughtful 
minister. 

The set cannot but be desired as soon as their worth is known 

The subjects treated are the leading topics of the day, and the writers 
are acknowledged authorities on the particular themes discussed. 

Note the remarkable list of names included among the contributors. 

Rev. James Iveeach, M.A., 

A. H.Hayce, M.A., 

Uev. J. Radfobd Thomson, M.A., 



Principal Cairns, 

Rev. C. A. Row, 

W. G. Blackie, D.D., LL.D., 

Prebendary Row, M.A., 

Rev. Noah Porter, D.D., 

Canon Rawlinson, 

S. R. Pattison, F.G.S., 

Dr. Friedrich Pfaff, 

Dean of Canterbury, 

Henry Wage, D.D., 

Rev. W. F. Wilkinson, M.A., 

James Legge, LL.D., 

Rev. W. G. Elmslie, M.A., 

Dean of Chester, 

J. Murray Mitchell, LL.D.. 

F. Codet, D.D., 

Eustace P. Conder, M.A., D.D 



Rev. William Arthuk, 

Sir W. Muir, 

Rev. A. B. Bruce, D.D., 

Alexander Maoalistir, M.A., M.D, 

Rev. G. F. Maolear, D.D., 

Rev. J. Stoughton, D.D., 

Rev. R. McCheyne Edgar, M.A.. 

Rev. John Cairns, D.D., 

Sir J. William Dawson, F.R.S., 

Rev. W. S. Lewis, M.A., 

Rev. John Kelly, 

Rev. M. Kaufmann, M.A., 

ri v on Girdlestone, 

a.J others. 



Can you in any other shape add to your library so much valuable 
material with so small an expenditure? 

These have until lately been sold at $1.25 per vol., $12.50 per set. 
The price has now been reduced to $10.00 per set, and we make the 
following 

Special Offer, viz. : We will send this remarkable set of books to 
any minister for the special net price of $7.50 Per Set. 



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